May 31, 2013 - Phoenix Sinclair Inquiry

The Honourable Edward (Ted) Hughes, Q.C.,
Commissioner
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Transcript of Proceedings
Public Inquiry Hearing,
held at the Delta Winnipeg Hotel,
350 St. Mary Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba
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FRIDAY, MAY 31, 2013

APPEARANCES
MS. S. WALSH, Commission Counsel
MR. D. OLSON, Senior Associate Counsel
MS. K. DYCK, Associate Commission Counsel
MR. R. MASCARENHAS, Associate Commission Counsel
MR. G. MCKINNON, for Department of Family Services and Labour
MR. T. RAY, for Manitoba Government and General Employees Union
MS. L. HARRIS, for General Child and Family Services Authority
MR. S. SCARCELLO, First Nations of Northern Manitoba Child and Family Services
Authority, First Nations of Southern Manitoba Child and Family Services Authority, and
Child and Family All Nation Coordinated Response Network
MR. H. KHAN, for Intertribal Child and Family Services
MR. J. GINDIN, for Mr. Nelson Draper Steve Sinclair and Ms. Kimberly-Ann Edwards
MR. J. FUNKE, for Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs and Southern Chiefs Organization Inc.
MS. M. VERSACE, for University of Manitoba, Faculty of Social Work
MR. W. HAIGHT, for Manitoba Métis Federation and Métis Child and Family Services
Authority Inc.
MS. C. DUNN, for Ka Ni Kanichihk Inc.
MR. G. TRAMLEY, for Aboriginal Council of Winnipeg Inc.

INDEX
PROCEEDINGS 1
WITNESSES:
BRADLEY DOUGLAS MCKENZIE
Page
Direct Examination (Olson) 6
Cross-Examination (McKinnon) 100
Cross-Examination (Harris) 111
Re-Examination (Olson) 112
PROCEEDINGS 114
BERNICE ANNE CYR
DIANE LOUISE ROUSSIN
SHARON ELAINE TAYLOR
DILLY MARIE KNOL
Direct Examination (Walsh) 120
Cross-Examination (Gindin) 192
EXHIBITS:
126 Curriculum vitae of Bradley Douglas 2
McKenzie
127 Chapter entitled: "Building Community 3
in West Region Child and Family Services
128 Chapter entitled "From Child Protection 4
to Community Caring in First Nations"
129 Chapter 6: "Differential Response in 4
Child Welfare, a New Early Intervention
Model"
130 Chapter 11: "Aboriginal Child Welfare 5
in Health Outcomes in Manitoba"
131 Chapter entitled "Community Building 5
Through Block Funding"

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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MAY 31, 2013
PROCEEDINGS CONTINUED FROM MAY 30, 2013
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MR. OLSON: Good morning, Mr. Commissioner.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right, Mr. Olson.
MR. OLSON: Morning, Dr. McKenzie.
THE WITNESS: Morning.
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MR. OLSON:
Just before we get started, I've
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provided the clerk with a list of the exhibits I intend to
file for this witness. It's been updated. There was one
exhibit that was omitted that is being retrieved by one of
the Commission staff, so there is a new numbering list and
I've asked the clerk to provide that to you this morning.
THE COMMISSIONER: Right.
MR. OLSON: That's, that's it. So document
number 131 is the document that's been handwritten in.
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes.
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MR. OLSON:
morning, shortly.
That will be coming over this
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THE COMMISSIONER: All right.
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MR. OLSON:
And so with that, we can get started
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with the witness once he's been sworn in.
THE COMMISSIONER: Right. Are you going to
identify those exhibits on the record?
MR. OLSON: I will.
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PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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sir.
THE CLERK: Want to do it now or ...
MR. OLSON: I'll wait till he's sworn in.
THE CLERK: If you could just stand for a moment,
Is it your choice to swear on the Bible or affirm
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without the Bible?
THE WITNESS: I will affirm.
THE CLERK: All right. State your full name to
the court, then.
THE WITNESS: Bradley Douglas McKenzie.
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THE CLERK:
And if you could spell your first
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name.
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THE WITNESS: Bradley, B-R-A-D-L-E-Y.
THE CLERK: Your middle name, please.
THE WITNESS: D-O-U-G-L-A-S.
THE CLERK: And your last name, please.
THE WITNESS: McKenzie, M-C capital K-E-N-Z-I-E.
THE CLERK: Thank you.
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BRADLEY DOUGLAS MCKENZIE,
affirmed, testified as follows:
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THE CLERK: Thank you. You may be seated.
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MR. OLSON:
Starting with the exhibits, first
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will be Dr. McKenzie's curriculum vitae, which will be
document -- sorry, Exhibit 126.
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PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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THE COMMISSIONER: Right.
THE CLERK: Exhibit 126.
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EXHIBIT 126:
CURRICULUM VITAE OF
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BRADLEY DOUGLAS MCKENZIE
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MR. OLSON: Next we'll go with Exhibit 127, which
is entitled, Community Building Through Block Funding,
which counsel will know as document number 79.
THE COMMISSIONER: Oh, wait a minute. 127 is
Building Community in West Region?
MR. OLSON: Sorry. That's correct, Mr.
Commissioner. This document, counsel know that as document
number 80.
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes.
THE CLERK: Exhibit 127.
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THE COMMISSIONER:
West Region is, is 127.
That's Building Community in
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MR. OLSON: That's right.
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EXHIBIT 127:
CHAPTER ENTITLED
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"BUILDING COMMUNITY IN WEST REGION
CHILD AND FAMILY SERVICES"
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MR. OLSON: And next, Exhibit 128 ...
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PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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THE CLERK: I don't have 127 (inaudible).
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Community Caring.
THE COMMISSIONER:
From Child Protection to
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MR. OLSON:
Sorry, 128 is From Child Protection
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to Community Caring in First Nations, which counsel know as
document 81.
THE COMMISSIONER: 128.
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EXHIBIT 128:
CHAPTER ENTITLED
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"FROM CHILD PROTECTION TO
COMMUNITY CARING IN FIRST NATIONS"
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MR. OLSON: 129 --
THE COMMISSIONER: Chapter 6.
MR. OLSON: Chapter 6 from -- entitled
Differential Response in Child Welfare, a New Early
Intervention Model, authored by Brad McKenzie, connecting
-- from the text Connecting Research Policy and Practice,
Child Welfare, second edition, which counsel know as
document 82A.
THE COMMISSIONER: 129.
THE CLERK: Exhibit 129.
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EXHIBIT 129: CHAPTER 6:
"DIFFERENTIAL RESPONSE IN CHILD
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PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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WELFARE, A NEW EARLY INTERVENTION
MODEL"
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MR. OLSON: Then 130 is Chapter 11: Aboriginal
Child Welfare and Health Outcomes in Manitoba, by Brad
McKenzie and Corbin Shangreaux titled, The Social
Determinants of Health in Manitoba, which counsel know as
82B.
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EXHIBIT 130: CHAPTER 11:
"ABORIGINAL CHILD WELFARE IN
HEALTH OUTCOMES IN MANITOBA"
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MR. OLSON:
And finally, the document that's
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being retrieved by Commission staff that we should have
shortly is going to be 131, and it's entitled Community
Building through Block Funding. Counsel have that document
and it's known as document 79.
THE CLERK: It will be Exhibit 131.
MR. OLSON: Thank you.
THE COMMISSIONER: 131.
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EXHIBIT 131:
CHAPTER ENTITLED
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"COMMUNITY BUILDING THROUGH BLOCK
FUNDING"
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. OLSON:
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Q
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Q
Good morning, Dr. McKenzie.
Morning.
First of all, let's start off, we're going to go
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through your CV a little bit, beginning with your
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educational background.
I understand that you have your
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bachelor of arts from the University of Regina, obtained in
1968?
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Q
Correct.
Your master of social work from the University of
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Manitoba in 1971?
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Q
Correct, yes.
And your Ph.D in social work from Arizona State
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University in 1989?
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Q
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That's correct.
Okay. Does that cover your educational degrees?
Yes.
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Q Thank you. You worked as a social worker in
northern Saskatchewan from 1968 to 1974 and in Thompson
from 1974 to 1975?
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A
Q
That is correct.
You've been employed as a professor at the
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University of Manitoba, faculty of social work, since
1976?
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A
Yes.
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Q And were acting associate dean from 1989 to 1990?
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Q
Correct.
Okay. You were director of the inner city social
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work program from 1981 to 1987 and have done extensive
consulting and program evaluation in the field of child
welfare?
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Q
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That is correct.
What's your teaching area of specialty?
My teaching area of specialty is social policy,
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program evaluation and child welfare.
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Q
In terms of aboriginal child welfare and policy
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do you have any expertise?
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A
I have done a number of evaluations of child
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welfare services in the aboriginal context, and Corbin
Shangreaux and I co-taught a course on child welfare and
aboriginal people as part of the curriculum at the faculty
of social work.
I've also worked as a child welfare worker in
northern Saskatchewan in aboriginal communities.
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Q
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Q
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And what's your current position?
I'm a professor of social work.
Thank you. That's at the University of Manitoba?
University of Manitoba.
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Q Now, I understand you've authored multiple
evaluations of the Child and Family Services west region
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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block funding model which were published, and these were
just filed as Exhibit 127.
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Q
Yes.
And they're, they're entitled Community Building
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Through Block Funding, and Exhibit 128 was entitled,
Building Community in West Region Child and Family
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Services.
So that's one of the evaluations you were just
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talking about?
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Q
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That's correct.
Or two of the evaluations, sorry.
Well, one is an article, I believe, and that's
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Exhibit 131.
And the 127 exhibit is the evaluation, the
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first evaluation that was completed in 1994.
Q Okay. Thank you. You've also conducted a
program evaluation of the general authority's differential
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response pilot project in 2011.
That's entitled Valuation
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of the General Child and Family Services Authority's
Differential Response Family Enhancement Pilot, and that's
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located at Commission disclosure 1850.
it in the binder in front of you as well.
There is a copy of
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A
That's correct.
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THE COMMISSIONER:
And what exhibit number is
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that?
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MR. OLSON:
That's actually been filed as a
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Commission disclosure previously. It's Commission
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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disclosure 1850.
And Mr. Commissioner, there should be a
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folder in front of you that contains the previously-filed
documents that were not made exhibits because they've
already been filed, and it should be located in there.
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exhibit number is.
THE COMMISSIONER:
I want to know what the
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MR. OLSON:
It's not an exhibit because it's
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been, it's been filed previously as a Commission
disclosure.
THE COMMISSIONER: Oh. It was what disclosure
number?
MR. OLSON: 1850.
THE COMMISSIONER: And it's -- what is it?
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MR. OLSON:
That is the evaluation that the
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witness did of the General Child and Family Services
Authority's Differential Response Family Enhancement Pilot
Project.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right.
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MR. OLSON:
Now, just received hot off the
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photocopier, copy of the Child Welfare Connecting Research
Policy and Practice, which is Exhibit 131. I'll hand it to
Madam Clerk.
THE CLERK: Exhibit 131.
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you.
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BY MR. OLSON:
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Q
During phase three of the inquiry we've heard the
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phrase "social determinants of health" referred to multiple
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times.
You co-authored a chapter from the book The Social
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Determinants of Health in Manitoba, which was published in
2010, and the chapter was entitled Aboriginal Child Welfare
and Health Outcomes in Manitoba, and we can find that at
Exhibit 130, I believe, now, which counsel know as document
82B.
Maybe we can just put that up on the monitor.
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That's 82B.
Scroll down just a little bit, please.
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That's, that's good. That's good.
First, can you just explain for the Commission
what is meant by the social determinants of health? What's
meant by that phrase?
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The social determinants of health have been used
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for some time in the literature to recognize that there are
broader range of factors that affect the health and
wellbeing of both adults and children than, than, than
direct health-related issues like immunity to illness and
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so on.
So they draw attention to factors such as poverty,
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income levels, housing, the -- and, and some authors talk
about the social determinants of health particularly in
relation to disadvantaged groups in society as including
things like racism and colonization, in the case of
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aboriginal people, as factors that, that affect the health
and wellbeing of, of those people.
Q Okay. In, in the chapter you cite some fairly
startling statistics.
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Right.
Now, this was published in 2010 so I understand
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some of these might be a little bit dated but I want to go
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through some of them with you.
The statistics, I
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understand, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but
they're meant to explain why there's such, at least in part
why there's such a serious over-representation of
aboriginal children in the child welfare system in Canada
as well as, as in Manitoba in particular; is that right?
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That is correct.
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Q Okay. So in terms of the statistics themselves,
and I'm not going to -- I have the document up on the
screen, they're referred to in pages 127 to 129 of the
chapter, and I'll just sort of summarize them rather than
going through them in the, in the chapter itself.
Firstly, in 2003, INAC, which found that
nationally 5.5 percent of all First Nations children living
on reserve were reported to be in child welfare care.
THE COMMISSIONER: What, what percent?
MR. OLSON: Five point five percent.
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BY MR. OLSON:
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Q
So 5.5 percent of all First Nation children were
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living on -- sorry, living on reserve were reported to be
in child welfare care, a rate which is eight times higher
than for all aboriginal and non-aboriginal children living
in care off reserve.
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Q
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That is correct.
Now, that's a Canada-wide statistic?
That's right.
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Q Okay. Using 2002 -- six -- sorry, using
2006/2007 figures from Manitoba Family Services and
Housing, the rate per 1,000 children in care for nonaboriginal
children was five, right?
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was 84.3?
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children?
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That's correct.
And the comparative rate for aboriginal children
Yes.
So that's five compared to 84.3 per thousand
Right.
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Q Data from the Manitoba Family Services and
Housing indicate that from 2007 to 2009 the rate for
aboriginal children in care increased by 20 percent
compared to 14.6 percent for non-aboriginal children.
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A
Correct.
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Q
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Is that right?
Yes.
And as of March, 2009, 86 percent of children in
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care were aboriginal?
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A
Q
Right.
And we know that from evidence we've heard
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in this inquiry, those statistics are pretty similar
today?
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A
Q
Yes.
Okay.
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THE COMMISSIONER:
Are they consistent across
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Canada or, or what are the variations?
THE WITNESS: There is some variation that exists
in other Canadian provinces, but the general trend of overrepresentation
is similar across Canada and in other
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jurisdictions such as Australia.
though, and Manitoba is quite high.
The rates do vary,
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THE COMMISSIONER:
But it's Canada-wide in its
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impact?
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THE WITNESS:
The, the disproportionality that
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exists is Canada-wide in impact.
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you.
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BY MR. OLSON:
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Q
In terms of the reasons for the disproportionate
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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representation of, of First Nation children in care, you go
on to cite some of the other statistics about poverty and
housing. You note that the rate of disabilities was almost
double, and this is a 2006 statistic --
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A
Q
Right.
-- I believe, the rate of disabilities was almost
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double the rate for all Canadian children, for aboriginal
children?
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Q
Correct.
The rate of overcrowding was double the Canadian
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rate?
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Q
Correct.
The high school completion rate was half the
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completion rate?
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Yes.
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Q For Canadians. The census date from 2006
indicates that in Manitoba the rate of poverty for First
Nation youth was 29 percent, which is nearly three times
higher than the overall poverty rate for the province?
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A
Q
Yes.
And in Winnipeg, nearly seven of every ten
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aboriginal children under six were living below Stats
Canada pre-tax low income cut-off?
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A
Q
That's correct.
Okay. We've heard some evidence about the impact
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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of colonialism on aboriginal people, through the inquiry,
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through, for example, Cindy Blackstock.
What's your own
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research shown in regards to the reason -- sorry, to the
impact of colonialism on the over, over-representation of
aboriginal children in the child welfare system?
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A
Well, colonialization is certainly an important
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factor in this over-representation.
We must think of
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colonization as including things like residential schools
and the nature of the way aboriginal people are
marginalized historically in society, but it also affects
some of the structural factors like poverty and so on that
are direct contributors to over-representation that -- the
over-representation of children in care.
The other related factor that's important to note
and, you know, we have to consider all of these things in
a, in a, in a general kind of way, is the fact that poverty
relates to issues such as addictions and other factors that
reflect parenting incapacity, and there is a relationship
between those, those two.
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Q
So when we're talking about historical conditions
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like colonization, sixties scoop, those types of things,
those all have an impact on poverty, housing issues, those
other, other things that need addressing now --
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A
Q
Yes.
-- is that what you're saying?
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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Yes.
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Q In terms of capacity-building in, in First
Nations communities, those -- the -- those issues have to
be addressed in order to make more capacity in the
communities, is that ...
A That, that is correct. You know, the importance
of decolonization includes attention to capacity building
in those communities, aboriginal and non-aboriginal
communities, even if we want to go beyond that, but
particularly in aboriginal communities because they are the
most impoverished communities that exist in Canada.
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THE COMMISSIONER:
And by capacity building you
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mean what?
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THE WITNESS:
I mean sort of developing the
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community's strengths and institutions to be able to work
collaboratively with child welfare organizations and other,
other institutions that are responsible for the education
and development of young people in particular, but we have
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to have economic development that puts people to work.
We
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have to have, you know, the community engaged in supporting
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families.
And so developing those kinds of strengths in
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community is what I mean by capacity-building in
communities.
THE COMMISSIONER: That's very helpful.
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BY MR. OLSON:
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Q
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Now, is that both on and off reserve?
That would be both on and off reserve.
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Q Okay. And in terms of the economic, I think you
said economic development?
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A
Q
Yes.
On reserve, how is that, how is that issue
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addressed in terms of economic development?
We've heard
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some evidence about reserves sometimes don't have the
capacity for, given the land situation or situation facing
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the reserve, there isn't the economic base to do that.
that something you're able to speak to?
Is
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A
That's a big challenge, of course, and that's not
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sort of my primary area of expertise but certainly job
creation and development of subsidized enterprises in those
communities can help build some of the economic development
activities that need to occur in those communities,
building more self-sufficiency around people being able to
sort of build their own homes and things of that nature
would be examples of the kind of initiatives that would
work, but it has to be coupled with, with training and
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development and other kind of supports.
And the Manitoba
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government has taken some initiatives in, in sort of
allocating employment opportunities to many of those
communities that are affected by -- or that are related to
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things like hydro development and road construction.
So
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those would be sort of some of the things that are
important to do in those communities.
Q Some of those partnerships with --
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A
That's right.
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Q -- the government in terms of providing
opportunity to First Nations communities --
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A
Q
That's correct.
-- is what you're talking about. And we've heard
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some evidence of that in terms of the hydro --
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Q
Right.
-- relationships. Okay.
Is that connected in any way to self-
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determination?
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A
Self-determination is an important part of that
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and self-determination is not only being able to sort of
establish those local priorities but also be able to
develop the capacity to self, self-manage your own services
and, and your own industry within your own community.
THE COMMISSIONER: And that would be a definition
of self-determination you've just given us?
THE WITNESS: That would be part of my definition
of it. Other people might disagree, but self-determination
and jurisdictional control would encompass those factors.
THE COMMISSIONER: And what else comes with --
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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THE WITNESS: Well --
THE COMMISSIONER: -- in your definition?
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THE WITNESS:
In, in my definition it includes,
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you know, the ability to make governance-related decisions,
it would include issues like being able to have input and
direction over sort of health, education, child welfare
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services in, in those local communities.
It would include
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the ability to negotiate with governments around the kind
of development that ought to exist. So those would be some
of the factors that I would characterize as being selfdetermination
--
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you.
THE WITNESS: -- and focus.
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BY MR. OLSON:
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Q
A
Q
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Would that be both on and off reserve?
Yes, although it's more complicated off reserve.
Right.
And, you know, because there's not community
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entities in the sense of being able to sort of do that in
a, in a, in a, you know, mandated community way as there
would be on reserves. So it is more complicated.
Q Okay. I understand. You talked about health,
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education and child welfare.
interrelated?
Are all of those areas
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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Q
They are indeed.
Okay. And can you explain a little bit about how
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that interrelationship works?
A Well, in the case of -- you know, education is --
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give you one example of education.
Education is very
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9
important to the development of the future wellbeing of
children. We know that from all kinds of research. Child
welfare services, because of neglect and child
maltreatment, oftentimes in some communities are required
10
to remove children from those communities.
That impacts
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
the degree of funding to education so there's a direct
relationship there about how those two service areas
interface.
As well, of course, the nature of collaboratively
working together to ensure the health and wellbeing of
children and families demands cooperation between child
welfare and education and the health services because the
business of raising children is everybody's business not
simply silos or, or particular institutions operating on
their own, on their own mandate.
21
Q
Okay. We've also heard that education could play
22
a role in preventing children from coming into contact with
23
24
the child welfare system.
speak about?
Is, is that something you can
25
A Yeah. Education -- I mean, there's, there's
- 20 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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2
3
4
5
several aspects of the way education can influence what
happens in the child welfare system. First of all, schools
can be a source of many of the kinds of programs, or a base
for many of the kinds of programs that could be helpful to
children and families to prevent children from coming into
6
care.
There are some jurisdictions, as well, that
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
actually, in larger communities at least, have a reporting
system set up in schools that allow them to pre-screen
families that need particular services and refer those
families to services that are needed and determine which
need to be referred on to child welfare agencies for
further investigation and, and, and service. So there's --
they can, they can help both at the front end and the back
14
end, if, if I can use that term.
And of course, the issue
15
16
17
of special needs children, one-third of which are served by
the child welfare system, is also an important aspect of
service for the school system. Those are --
18
THE COMMISSIONER:
Where, where is that kind of
19
referral system you just referred to working today?
20
THE WITNESS:
One example is Child Wellbeing
21
22
23
24
Centres that are set up in New South Wales, Australia,
where they have these centres in the education system, the
health system and the police, and they do pre-screening of
families through those services.
25
- 21 -

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2
3
BY MR. OLSON:
Q That's, that's interesting. They're called Child
Wellbeing Centres?
4
A
That's correct.
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
Q Tell us a little bit about the screening. They
-- so a child is going to enter the school?
A Yes. What, what happens there is these, these
staff, small staff units have a reporting guide that is
established and they are trained in sort of being able to
determine when families reach a threshold requiring
referral to a child welfare agency, but they also have a
responsibility to provide soft hand-offs to community
agencies that would provide early intervention services to
families that might require those services prior to a
referral being necessary.
Q Okay. So I want to talk to you about early
intervention.
18
19
20
21
A
Q
A
Q
Right.
That's different than child welfare services?
Yes.
What we normally think of where the agency gets
22
involved, the child welfare agency; is that right?
23
A
Well, there is areas of overlap. I would tend to
24
define early intervention as more of a continuum. And if I
25
can use a public health sort of analogy here:
If we have
- 22 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
an ideal public health system it looks a little bit like a,
a pyramid where we have more primary prevention services at
the bottom rung broadly available to families or to, to, to
everybody in society. Universal programs --
5
6
7
Q
A
Q
Right.
-- for the large part.
Give us a couple of examples of what those might
8
be?
9
10
A Well, in health sector, of course, they're
inoculation, vaccination, all of those kinds of things.
11
12
Q
A
Okay.
In early intervention in the health sector it
13
14
includes sort of more targeted sort of efforts to reach
children, adults that, that need special kinds of education
15
and early intervention services.
And then, of course, you
16
have the tertiary or treatment level.
17
18
Q
A
Okay.
If we want to apply that to the child welfare
19
system we would have more than three rungs of service.
At
20
21
22
23
24
the bottom level we do still have sort of universal level
kinds of programs, and those would be things like early
childhood education, parent, parenting programs and so on
that are broadly available to people in the community on a
voluntary basis.
25
Q
Okay.
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1
A
Then we would have early intervention services
2
3
4
that are available, more targeted programs that are
available to families that have, they're very well
adjusted, very well able to take advantage of those
5
programs and do so on a voluntary basis.
Let's say you're
6
7
a family that has a special needs child or a child with a
disability but you need extra supports, those kinds of
8
targeted programs.
If you move up that rung you run more
9
10
11
12
13
into families that often don't use those voluntary
services. Perhaps there are impairments such as addictions
and those kinds of things that really demand targeted
programs that may have a certain amount of requirement,
they're not entirely voluntary, there's some non-voluntary
14
nature to those services.
Those kinds of non -- those
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
kinds of targets programs are important for that next rung
of families that aren't making use of and doing well and
their children are at greater level of risk.
And then if you move up that tier you, you have
child protection services that are provided to families to
support children in their own homes by the child welfare
system.
22
23
24
25
Q
A
Q
A
Right.
And children in out-of-home care.
I see.
And it's those targeted services at those, at the
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1
2
3
4
child welfare agency level and some of the non-voluntary or
high risk families that are, that, that I would still
classify as early intervention but they do interface with
the child welfare system. Does that help?
5
Q
That helps a lot. That's sort of the top rung of
6
what you'd call early intervention?
7
8
A
Q
Yes.
And below that we're looking at services provided
9
10
by, you know, various community services, government
agencies.
11
12
13
A
Q
A
Other government agencies, et cetera.
Et cetera. All sorts of service providers.
That's right.
14
Q And we've heard from many of them --
15
16
17
A
Q
A
Right.
-- to date in this inquiry.
Yes.
18
19
Q Okay. And you identify things like early
childhood education, maybe housing programs?
20
21
22
A
Q
A
Right.
Daycares, adult education, things of that nature?
Absolutely.
23
24
25
Q Okay. I'm going to spend a little more time on
that a little later, but before we get there, and I sort of
got a bit ahead of myself, I want to talk to you about
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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2
3
4
5
devolution. We're on sort of the topic of selfdetermination
and cultural identity and, and that area.
You wrote a journal article in 2003, and you have
a copy of it in front of you, it's, it was called Extending
Aboriginal Control Over child Welfare Services.
6
MR. OLSON:
It's Commission disclosure 1735 and
7
8
9
10
11
12
it's, you have a copy, Mr. Commissioner, in the same set of
documents that have already been filed.
THE COMMISSIONER: Oh, all right. What
disclosure number?
MR. OLSON: 1735.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right.
13
14
BY MR. OLSON:
15
Q
And I don't think it's necessary to actually go
16
17
18
19
20
21
to the document unless you need to; you certainly can. But
you talked about missed opportunities in the paradigm shift
over to devolution. And we've heard a lot about devolution
to date and we don't necessarily need to go through that.
You talked about a community caring paradigm. What did you
mean by that?
22
A
Community caring paradigm, as we've described it,
23
24
25
gives special attention to building capacity in communities
along the lines of my earlier comments where you are
working to develop partnerships with organizations and
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2
3
4
5
6
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9
communities and make sure that those services are
coordinated in the best interests of children and families,
but you are also building capacity in communities where
there are serious problems in the way those -- that they're
not strong communities, they're vulnerable communities.
And so that focus on community, community caring sort of
incorporates that level of service along with protecting
the safety of children through more traditional child
welfare investigation and, and services and the provision
10
of enhanced family supports to, to families.
So it's not
11
12
13
14
-- a community caring model doesn't mean you focus only on
the community; you combine the best features of those three
different models of service.
Q I see. A community caring model. What, what,
15
16
what does it look like in practice?
features of it?
Like, what are the
17
A
Well, it includes adequate attention to child
18
19
safety and, and the range, if it's a child welfare agency
providing these, providing services to ensure the
20
protection of children.
It includes, though, beyond that,
21
22
23
24
25
a well-defined and well-funded range of services to help
support families that operate in conjunction with other
kinds of support services to families in the community and
it includes efforts to sort of work with the community to
coordinate those services and develop their capacity and
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2
3
interest and knowledge of child welfare so that child
welfare becomes everybody's business in the community.
Q Right. So more of a community approach --
4
5
A
Q
That's right.
-- to child welfare.
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
A That's right. And we have used an example of
some of the work that was done in west region as
approaching that kind of a model.
Q Okay. We're -- and we're going to talk about
west region a little bit because it's an interesting study
and results.
In terms of protecting children, what, what does
13
a community-caring approach do?
I mean, because it's not
14
15
the normal protection screen where you're doing a child
investigation, taking a child out of the home, that sort of
16
thing, so what -- necessarily.
I mean, I know that's part
17
18
of it, but how does a community caring approach protect
children?
19
A
Well, it does include sort of the normal child
20
21
22
23
protection sort of functions of a child welfare agency but
beyond that it involves the community in intervening
informally and, and trying to support children in ways that
they can, without the necessity of that, that occurring in,
24
in all cases.
But certainly that formal investigation of
25
abuse and maltreatment is, is still a part of what, what is
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
needed because sometimes those interventions are necessary.
2
Q
So that, so if a child is in danger, the child
3
still gets the help?
4
5
A
Q
Absolutely.
But if the child isn't showing up for school,
6
someone makes sure the child gets to school?
7
A
That's right, yeah.
8
Q And --
9
A
And in a lot of those kinds of community,
10
11
12
13
14
informal -- formal and informal roles of both community
members and other community agencies occur to try and sort
of work with those families in a less intrusive manner.
Q Okay. So a big part of that is the community
providing supports?
15
A
Yes.
16
17
Q So you need that infrastructure, need that
community there to have success?
18
19
A
Q
That's right.
Now that's, that's a -- you advocated for that
20
community caring shift in this, in that paper?
21
22
23
A
Q
A
We did.
Okay. Is that still something you support?
It is.
24
25
Q Okay. In the article you, you've especially
advocated that sort of approach for aboriginal communities?
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
A
That's correct.
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Q Okay. You also made the argument, I think you
made the argument, that's my, my take on it, that that's an
opportunity that was missed with devolution, and we've
heard the criticism before in this inquiry that what
happened with devolution, it was still the same services,
still the same model that, you know, the same old
protection model, just being provided by, you know, First
Nations instead of not, you know. Is that, is that sort of
what you were arguing in the paper?
11
A
Well, I wouldn't characterize it quite that
12
boldly. I think --
13
14
Q
A
Right.
-- the intent was, in the devolution process, and
15
16
17
there was a very collaborative process followed by
government in work with aboriginal organizations to, to
develop that model of devolution, and that was sort of well
18
done.
The assumption was that transferring jurisdictional
19
20
21
control would pave the way both for providing more
culturally appropriate services but also evolving different
types of service that would be more appropriate to their
22
particular communities.
The problem was that, you know,
23
24
25
not -- that the development of those kinds of models or the
conceptualization of those models and the funding that
would ensure the development of those kinds of services
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
were not adequately attended to at the front end.
And
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
then, as a result, when devolution occurred, agencies were
so inundated, if you will, with the child protection
mandate, the building their own staff capacity for services
and the increase in families being referred and children
coming into care, that we know from, from the statistical
evidence happened, that they really didn't have the time in
many, in most cases, to develop those kinds of models of
9
service that I'm speaking about.
And it was further
10
11
12
13
influenced by the lack of funding that would help make
those things happen.
Q Right. Devolution was a pretty massive shift in
the way --
14
15
16
17
A
Q
A
Q
Yeah, it was.
-- in what was happening at the time?
Right.
The, the community caring paradigm sounds like
18
19
20
paradigm that wouldn't be exclusive to the aboriginal
community; it would be something that could work for
everyone. Is that --
21
A
Absolutely.
22
23
24
Q Okay. Is there anything other than building
community capacity that would be required in order to make
that sort of shift, paradigm shift?
25
A
Well, I think there, there are examples of, of
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
what is needed to, to help spur that kind of development
2
that we see in other jurisdictions.
So for example, there
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
are special targeted called communities for children
initiatives that have been undertaken by the national
government in Australia that targets sort of vulnerable
communities and it developed special initiatives to try and
build that community capacity that I'm speaking about.
It's sort of a mechanism for making that happen rather than
sort of a different -- well, it's a different model of a
10
way of implementing what I'm speaking about.
So there are
11
12
13
14
15
examples of where that's been attempted and some efforts to
try and sort of build those, the capacity that I'm talking
about in, in the community-caring model.
Q What sort of results have those, those people --
areas that have implemented the community caring approach?
16
A
There's been evaluations of those and some of
17
those results are quite encouraging.
It's a long term
18
19
20
21
strategy, however, and it's, it's not something that you
see results from in two or three months or even two -- or
even one or two years, so --
Q Right. So --
22
A
-- it's, it's something that needs to be examined
23
24
and supported over a significant period of time.
Q We heard, we, we heard from Kerry McCuaig
25
yesterday.
I'm not sure if you're familiar with her work.
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
She's, works around the area of early childhood education.
2
3
A
Q
Um-hum.
She showed us an example of how social policy
4
with respect to the elderly has changed over --
5
6
A
Q
Right.
-- you know, last 20 years where we went to have
7
a bad record to a fairly low poverty rate for old -- the
8
elderly.
Is, is that something that you expect could
9
10
11
12
13
happen with child welfare if the right policies were
implemented? Is that something you've looked at?
A Well, it could happen. I mean, part of the
reason that that's happened with respect to the elderly
have been significant improvements to, you know, pension
14
provisions and so on from the national level.
And one of
15
16
17
the problems we have in, in Canada is that we do not have
enough national leadership on some of these kinds of issues
that would produce quickly that kind of impact in child
18
19
20
welfare.
follow.
But it is a model to look at and a model to
And, you know, if I can just comment one, one
21
step further.
Initially, the Australian initiatives were
22
23
24
25
targeted primarily at families with children zero to five
and there was enough success with those efforts that they
extended the range of those programs to target families
with children zero to twelve in, as I say, particularly
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
vulnerable communities across that country.
Q Okay. In terms of the, the costs and the
services to provide the, the, the programming to people
that's required, the community supports, how, how would you
5
see that being done?
I mean, we're, we're not talking
6
7
about that being provided through the child welfare system,
are we?
8
A
Well, some of those services, I think, can be
9
10
11
provided through the child welfare system but it requires
other kinds of investments as well.
Q Okay. In your article you talk about purchase
12
13
service agreements.
there?
What's, what are you contemplating
14
A
I'm not sure where we referred to purchase
15
16
17
18
service agreements, but I would see the, the non-government
sector as having an important role to play. I want to make
it clear, though, that that doesn't sort of involve taking
money away from the child welfare system and providing it
19
to the non-government sector.
It means sort of providing
20
funding to both.
It's not an either/or question here if
21
we're going to have a good interface of services.
It
22
23
24
25
demands what we would sometimes refer to as a whole-ofgovernment
approach where we have the enhanced capacity of
the child welfare system, we have education, health systems
working in collaboration with the health -- with the child
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welfare system and we have the non-government sector also
playing an important and key role.
And in terms of funding, and that's a very
legitimate question in these kinds of times, it does
require some additional funding but it also requires us to
look whether we can find some efficiencies in the way we
do, currently do business so that that money can be used in
different ways than it is currently being used.
Q I see. On the topic of efficiencies there's,
there's two points I want to -- two questions I want to ask
11
you about.
One relates to evidence we heard from Kerry
12
13
14
15
McCuaig, and that's the way things are sort of set up now
there are all sorts of community agencies all over the
place providing different services and it's a bit of a mixmash
ad hoc sort of picture.
16
17
A
Q
Right.
And what she was advocating is sort of one
18
19
20
21
government umbrella providing streamlined services that
it's clear where they're coming from and, you know, the
funding is clear and it's, it's, you know, clear model. Is
that something you've looked at or have any thoughts on?
22
A
Well, I haven't looked at it in detail, but I
23
would say this:
The more, the more organizations you have
24
in the community, it does exacerbate the difficulty of
25
coordination.
And we have a lot of sort of community
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
organizations that do get funding and do provide services.
We do not have a large well-developed, and if I can use the
term, professionalized non-government organization sector
that does quasi child and family-related services in this
province, not nearly as large as in some other locations in
6
some other countries.
So we have to move cautiously there
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
in, in sort of trying to build that network of services but
also make sure that attention is played to coordination.
Her suggestion might be one way of trying to ensure that.
We have to build in systems of accountability so that if
funding is provided, there are certain kinds of
expectations for delivery of results that relate to that
funding so that you can measure effectiveness along the way
to ensure that that's working in the best interests of
families and children.
16
Q
Right. Also on the idea of efficiencies we heard
17
18
19
from, for example, the Eagle Urban Transition Centre, which
provides services to help new people to Winnipeg, new
aboriginal people to Winnipeg find housing and those sorts
20
of things.
Every year they're applying for funding and
21
22
23
24
25
from the different government agencies or whatever, it's
usually the same funding but it's applying for multiple
areas of funding, different applications, a lot of process
and obviously a lot of work to get the same funding. Would
it make -- in short-term funding.
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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2
3
4
Would it -- are, are you talking about where
there's a commitment to provide funding for longer periods
of time, not necessarily more money but just that the money
is there? Is that the sort of thing you're referring to?
5
A
Well, I think, you know, I wouldn't be able to
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
speak with a great deal of expertise about that. I do know
there are a number of services that provide those kinds of
transition services for people moving from the reserve to
the urban setting like Winnipeg, and certainly some
coordination and longer-term commitment to funding for
those kinds of services would seem to make sense. But, you
know, I would defer making too much of a judgment on that.
Q Okay. Is it possible to implement the community
caring approaching in an urban centre like Winnipeg?
15
A
I think you can do aspects of it and you do that
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
through working within neighbourhoods, and the kind of, the
kind of organizations that are -- that exist in those
neighbourhoods and the other kinds of health services.
Like, let's say it's in the Mount Carmel health, regional
health area, you work with that kind of agency. So you can
do some of that at least in, in the urban setting, probably
not -- it is more complicated, as I mentioned before, but I
think more of that can be done.
24
Q
Okay. Would there have to be a commitment to and
25
a recognition of the community resources that are there for
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
the people that need them?
A That's correct. And, you know, one of the ways
you could maybe do that, and again, I've seen examples of
this, is you have a community with a series of agencies
that provide services, and you provide funding to a lead
agency to help coordinate those services among the agencies
and among the child welfare, the child welfare agency that
8
serves those communities.
So that's one of the ways to
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
establish at least the kind of coordinated capacitybuilding
we talk about in the community caring model.
Q Okay. Just want to move on now to the West
Region Child and Family Services funding, block funding
model, the study that you looked at - prepared.
Now, there was an innovative funding model, it
was a block funding model that was implemented, and you
looked at how that worked and what the results were?
17
A
Right.
18
19
Q Okay. Can you just give a brief background of,
of the history of that?
20
A
Well, the funding model was negotiated by Elsie
21
Flette, who was director of west region at the time, and
22
23
the Indian Affairs at the time, INAC at the time.
think the funding model was negotiated in 1991.
It -- I
It really
24
didn't start until about 1992, but the basic idea behind it
25
was the federal government was initiated
-- or was
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
interested in it because it gave them predictability in
funding and it removed some of the administrative burden
3
from, from them.
And from the agency's point of view it
4
provided them with more flexibility in how those funds
5
could be used.
And as a part of that flexibility was the
6
ability to carry over surpluses.
They could provide for
7
8
9
10
the, for, for, for the children that needed out-of-home
care through the child maintenance budget, if they could
save money there they could build up surpluses which could
be invested in alternate programs at the community level.
11
And that's essentially what they did.
They were able to
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
save money, they were able to invest in alternate programs
that reduced the rate of children in care over time,
developed a number of alternative programs in the community
that provided better care for children closer to home than
having to send them out to residential care, and they built
community capacity by engaging more effectively with the
community and how services should be developed in their
community.
So in the year 2004/2005, for example, about 40
percent of that child welfare maintenance budget was being
spent on alternative programming that helped to build
community capacity and ensure the wellbeing of families and
24
children.
That's a very brief summary of, of the way that
25
that fund operated.
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1
It is, to my knowledge now, no longer in
2
3
4
existence.
Q
A
Right.
It was changed in 2010 to a different funding
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
model, but that's how it operated during that period of
time. And in my opinion, it was quite successful.
Q Okay. That was just the federal maintenance
monies that were block-funded; is that right?
A That's correct. It, it wasn't -- it did not
involve block funding of provincial money for child
maintenance, it only affected child maintenance for
federally funded children.
13
Q
Do you know, were there any additional monies
14
15
provided to west region other than those that would have
been provided normally? Do you have any knowledge of that?
16
A
The additional monies, my understanding over
17
18
19
time, the children's special allowances were able to be
used as part of the funding for these early intervention
programs or alternative programs.
20
21
Q
A
Okay.
So that was some source. They also suffered sort
22
23
24
25
of claw-backs over the years, though. At certain points in
time there was a reduction in foster care rates and that
reduced the funding in that particular -- at that juncture.
So there were some, some changes.
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1
2
There were two problems, I think it's worth
mentioning, with the block funding arrangement that existed
3
at the time.
It's very important in block funding,
4
5
6
7
8
particularly when you're taking money -- you know, when
you're talking about the child maintenance portion of your
budget, to make sure the block fund is adequate to permit
the opportunity to have some flexibility in savings and be
able to invest that in alternate programs. So --
9
10
Q
A
Right.
-- the size of that block is very important. And
11
one of the things that did not exist for west region was an
12
annual sort of increase in the amount of that block.
And
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
why that's important is that as you build alternate
programs you also staff them and staff costs tend to go up,
and so those are factors that do need to be considered in
any kind of a block funding of child maintenance
initiative.
Q Okay. Now, what you describe in terms of how
west region operated sounds a lot like the community caring
approach you were advocating. Is, is --
21
22
A
Q
That's correct.
Okay. You said it was, in your view it was quite
23
successful. And what do you take as a measure of success?
24
A
Well, I think, first of all, the rate of federal
25
children in care declined significantly, about, by about 40
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
percent over about a 12-year period of time.
The costs,
2
3
4
the per diem costs or the child of child maintenance for
that period of time were maintained or -- and, and became
less than the average for the region in general. So from a
5
cost effectiveness basis it was, it was successful.
There
6
7
8
9
10
11
were quality assurance audits to make sure that the quality
of services provided to children were maintained, and this,
the results of those audits were quite positive. You know,
reducing costs for children in care, I mean if you wanted
to be extreme you could just take fewer children into care
but it might jeopardize their safety.
12
Q
Right.
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
A That wasn't happening in this particular
instance. And of course, a range of alternate programs and
partnerships with other community agencies were developed
that provided a range of better services within those
communities and the agency engaged quite effectively with
the community in planning and developing child welfare
committees in the community to bring the community closer
to their engagement in child welfare.
21
Q
In the articles that you, you prepare, you
22
23
prepared, you discuss the importance of community child
welfare committees.
24
A
That's correct.
25
Q First of all, where are the child welfare
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
committees?
2
A
In each of the communities in west region they
3
set up local committees.
They were usually composed of
4
elders and other community people with a commitment to
5
children and families.
They were provided with training
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
and the local workers in those communities worked with that
child welfare committee, sometimes in intervening
informally with families but also providing formal advice
about things like who should be foster parents and what
kind of services should be provided in those communities,
so they were very active and engaged in the child welfare
mission in those communities.
Q Okay. Do you -- did you look at whether or not
there was an impact in, on the community as a whole, aside
from, you know, the child welfare situation, in terms of
attendance at school and --
17
18
19
20
21
A
Q
A
Q
A
No.
-- economically?
We didn't examine those factors.
Would you expect there to be an impact?
I would have expected some positive effects there
22
23
24
but, you know, I can't verify that.
Q Okay. Terms of building trust with the
community, we've heard that mistrust between --
25
A
Right.
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1
Q
-- child welfare authorities and the community is
2
3
4
often a problem. Was that -- was there any examination if,
if trust was -- there was a fostering of trust as a result
of the way west region was operating.
5
A
We, we found evidence of some at least shift in
6
that.
Perhaps it's more anecdotal evidence than sort of
7
8
9
10
comprehensive surveys but, for example, the agency would
engage with the community in, in planning workshops and
developing priorities and people who were clients and -- of
the agency would come to these and engage with, with the
11
workers.
We had examples of, of parents who would come to
12
the agency and comment about -- and she'd come to a sewing
13
class, for example.
All her children had -- you know, she
14
had been into care and then come back home and, and talk
15
about the fact that, you helped save my life.
So there
16
17
18
19
were those kinds of examples that showed some evidence that
at least there was a change in the relationship between
both parents and, and community members with respect to
child welfare. Wasn't universal.
20
21
Q
A
All right.
And, you know, there's always sort of levels of
22
23
24
25
mistrust and problems that do exist with respect to the
mission of child welfare, but those were examples of that
shift.
Q Okay. In terms of the implementation of the
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1
2
3
block funding type program for other First Nations, do you
see any problems with using that type of a, of a block
funding program?
4
A
Well, I know it's, it's of interest to some and,
5
6
but -- and, and it is something that I think is worth
looking at, but I would come back to certain guidelines
7
that have to be in place.
And that would -- one of them
8
9
10
would be a way of ensuring that the block grant agreed to
is adequate to provide for the children that need out of
home care and potentially give the agency some flexibility
11
in how they can use surpluses.
It would need to take into
12
13
14
15
consideration extraordinary factors, like for example, if a
community has, is threatened by fire and all the children
need to be removed from the community and this triggers
extraordinary child welfare expenses, these cannot be met
16
within a block.
Because one of the features of a block
17
18
19
20
grant is that the agency must, must manage their
expenditures within that block and be responsible for any
deficits. So there has to be a way of covering deficits in
extraordinary circumstances that are beyond the agency's
21
ability to control.
Given those factors, it is -- and
22
23
24
25
capacity within the agency to be able to sort of move in
this direction with the community, it has potential for
application in other communities.
Q Okay. So you would need some strong leadership
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1
within the agency --
2
A
That's right.
3
Q -- and the capacity would have to be there --
4
5
6
A
Q
A
Yeah.
-- within that particular agency?
Right.
7
Q But it would be something that --
8
9
10
A
Q
A
Yes.
-- could be feasible?
Yes.
11
12
Q Okay. I want to move now to the topic of
differential response.
13
14
A
Q
Okay.
Before I get into the details of that or before
15
16
17
18
we discuss the details, if you would, could you give the
Commissioner a sort of a brief high level overview of
exactly what differential response is, what it means or how
you would describe it?
19
A
First thing I would say is differential response
20
is defined differently in some, or in, in jurisdictions.
21
22
23
Q
and --
A
So if you could, with, for the Manitoba response
For the Manitoba context.
24
Q -- and just how it differs from --
25
A
Right.
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1
Q
-- what we'll call the traditional protection
2
approach that was --
3
4
A
Q
Yeah.
-- applied in Manitoba.
5
6
A Yeah. In the, in the Manitoba context, the
definition of differential response is closely allied with
7
the notion of family enhancement services.
It mirrors the
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
model that has been applied in places like Minnesota and
other American, other American states, and probably Western
Australia.
What it consists of is the development of
essentially two streams of service, so a referral comes in
to the agency, it is reviewed at the intake level, and
there's a determination made whether safety of the child in
15
the immediate future is at risk or not.
And if it is not
16
17
18
at risk immediately, the case could be referred to what we
would call the differential response or family enhancement
stream. If it is at risk, it would be referred to the more
19
traditional child protection stream.
And in the child
20
21
protection stream, the focus would be on investigation and
the evidence around neglect and abuse and whether court
22
23
action or other kinds of services are, are required.
would be the investigation stream.
That
24
25
In the family enhancement stream, the approach
would be to avoid the investigation focus and still over a
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2
3
4
5
6
period of time ensure that the future probability of risk
was manageable but do an assessment of the family's
strengths and needs and provide family focused services or
enhances family support services to the family to help them
improve parenting and ensure the protection of child safety
through a less intrusive and more engagement-focused way of
7
providing service.
And the important aspects of this
8
9
10
approach would be more intensive services where the social
worker provides counselling and support services on a more
intensive level than would be normally available to such
11
families.
The family -- you must engage with the family,
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
so the family must be willing to engage with that, with the
social worker in, in, in providing these services, and the
family and the social worker also engage with other
services in the community that can help partner a response
to support this particular family to improve parenting and
protect child safety.
Q Okay. And on the protection side it looks
essentially the same as it did previously?
20
A
Yes. Although, you know, it is important to note
21
22
23
24
25
that on the protection side, even though investigation is
the focus, workers do strive to develop working
relationships and supportive relationships with those
families to improve the wellbeing of those children. So, I
mean, the difference, the difference is, is important but
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3
4
5
6
7
8
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12
13
it doesn't mean that the approach used in the family
enhancement stream should not be used and cannot be used to
an extent in the child protection stream.
Q Okay. So you, you can still use the D.R.
approach or the differential response approach in the
protection stream; they're not necessarily mutually
exclusive?
A That's right. They're not mutually exclusive and
developing that approach within the child protection stream
makes sense as well.
Q Okay. If, if we take a look at, it's document
82A in the binder in front of you, which was filed as
Exhibit 129, I'm told. Right. Page 101. So that's right
14
after the cover, cover sheet.
This is from the, the text,
15
16
Child Welfare, second edition, Connecting Research Policy,
and Practice.
17
18
A
Q
Right.
This is the, the chapter, Differential Response
19
20
21
in Child Welfare, A New Early Intervention Model.
THE COMMISSIONER: What year was this published?
THE WITNESS: 2011.
22
23
BY MR. OLSON:
24
Q
I think this, this is the second -- yeah, this is
25
the second edition.
I'm looking at, in the second
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1
2
paragraph, it's a large paragraph near the bottom where it
says:
3
4
"As indicated in Chapter 1, ..."
5
6
7
This is talking about, I take it, the protection, the older
protection model. Yeah. Says:
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
"As indicated in Chapter 1, the
rate of children in care increased
by [50]% over this [first] year
period. As to effectiveness,
there are persistent concerns
about the mixed outcomes for
children in care, and whether or
not children from families
referred for services are being
adequately protected from harm.
For example, large numbers of
children are referred for
investigations, but only a
minority receives ongoing
services. Yet a significant
number of children are re-referred
later."
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2
3
4
The reason I'm highlighting that is because when
we, we looked at the case, the circumstances of Phoenix
Sinclair's case, in her short life, we saw that her file
was opened and closed many times.
5
6
A
Q
Right.
And there weren't necessarily service, services
7
provided in her case.
8
A
Right.
9
10
11
Q Now, are you saying that the D.R. model,
differential response model, is meant to address that sort
of a situation? Is that ...
12
A
It -- the D.R. model does, in fact, attempt to
13
address that, at least in a partial way.
And because it
14
15
16
17
intervenes earlier with these families that, in some cases,
might be closed because of volume and provides a range of
services that can help support these families, the intended
objective is that fewer of these families would be
18
re-referred for investigation in the future.
And there's
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
some evidence in evaluations, longer-term evaluations that
have been done of these kinds of programs that that does,
in fact, occur. The results are a little bit mixed in that
regard because you establish a fairly trustworthy working
relationship with some of these families and in some cases
they may voluntarily come back and ask for additional types
of assistance from the agencies. So --
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
Q
A
context.
Right.
-- it's important to sort of take that into
Sometimes a re-referral for investigation is a
4
5
different thing than coming back and asking for some
helpful service that might be needed --
6
7
8
Q
A
Q
Okay.
-- or referral to another agency.
In the model itself, when you're talking about
9
10
11
12
the workers, the two different streams, is it -- first of
all, is, is, is the idea that there be two different kinds
of workers, one a differential response worker and one the
traditional sort of protection worker?
13
A
Well, I think the model, in actual fact, can play
14
out in different ways.
15
16
Q
A
Okay.
In larger settings you can create a separate unit
17
18
where you would have a different unit providing those
family enhancement services and providing the child
19
investigation or child protection services.
And in those
20
21
22
23
cases, you know, the services tend to be somewhat separate.
When you're dealing with smaller communities, it
may be an individual worker within, within a unit rather
than a separate, a separate unit per se.
24
25
Q
A
Okay.
And, as I said before, some of these types of
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
services are transferrable at least to some of the families
that are served in the child protection context so the
separation of workers and skills may no longer apply if
you're using more and more of these kinds of approaches in
5
your child protection stream.
You will not be, in family
6
7
8
9
enhancements services, doing the same -- taking the same
focus on investigation but you, you, you may distinguish
between families that need that approach and those that
don't.
10
11
12
Q
A
Q
Okay.
Have I muddied the waters?
Maybe a little bit but we'll try and sort that
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
out. What's the ideal approach? Is it ideal to have
separate workers doing family enhancement and protection or
is there an ideal?
A I'm not sure there is. I think we need more
evidence to establish what that ideal is, and one of my
concerns is that we don't evaluate the, in a long -- we
don't do enough evaluation over the long term to determine
20
the evidence about which model works the best.
My concern
21
22
would be about sort of folding the separateness of the
family enhancement stream into child protection prematurely
23
is that you lose that special focus.
On the other hand,
24
25
you know, there is enough evidence that it can work across
for many of the families that are traditionally served by
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
child protection so I wouldn't advocate that, right now at
2
3
least, one model is absolutely superior to the other.
think we need more evidence of which model works the best.
I
4
5
6
7
Q Okay. And I know we're due for a break soon. I
just want to ask you one, one more area before we do that.
If you look at the article in front of you, page
103. There, right in the middle of the page, that
8
9
paragraph where it says, "There is an argument".
that?
You see
10
11
12
A
Q
Yes.
Says:
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
"There is an argument that
differential response is not
really 'new', ... that it simply
reflects good child welfare
practice which incorporates
interventions based on familycentred
practice, increased use of
community-based resources, and an
earlier form of intervention for
some families."
23
24
Then you go on:
25
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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2
3
4
5
"This observation has some
validity, and there are a number
of examples in Canada of
community-based early intervention
responses ..."
6
7
8
9
10
Indeed, we went through a number of those, west
region and, I don't know that, I'm not sure if differential
response was referred to back then, I'm not sure if it was
around. You probably would know that. What, what's the
11
response to that criticism?
Because I mean, as a lay
12
13
14
15
16
person, I always thought social workers do that, connect
families with resources they need; if they identify a
problem with addictions they connect the family with
addictions resources, that sort of thing. So what is, what
is new about differential response?
17
A
Well, I think, first of all I think the, the, the
18
new aspect of differential response is that specialized
19
focus on supporting families.
It doesn't mean -- what I'm
20
21
22
23
24
25
saying there is that it doesn't mean it never existed in
the past but there were factors in the way that our child
welfare system has been structured that make it difficult
to use those kinds of approaches in all cases, not the
least of which the high caseloads and workloads that
workers carry and the priority that is off, while it is
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
absolutely given, both in the legislation and morally in
society, to focus on the safety of children as a first
3
concern.
And so the time in order to do that is, is often
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
sort of limited.
The other piece is that the skill set of workers
may not be such that they can provide both of those types
of services so there needs to be an emphasis on ensuring
that that skill set and clinical capacity is there.
When you move to differential response you say,
we are taking a special focus on that and we are providing
somewhat lower caseloads, not low enough in my opinion, but
somewhat lower caseloads so that people have more time to
13
provide more intensive services.
And in the case of the
14
15
16
17
18
way the pilot projects in the general Child and Family
Service authority were established, workers with special
skills and willingness to and experience to work in that
way were recruited to provide those kinds of services that
move naturally into providing that kind of a supportive
19
family, family-focused type of service.
So it became more
20
systematic.
Doesn't mean it never occurred but it became
21
more systematic in this kind of approach.
And if we
22
23
24
25
maintain that emphasis and we build practice skills and
knowledge to be able to do that kind of service, that trend
will continue and continue to provide perhaps the kind of
services that families need, which is more support rather
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
than investigation in all cases.
2
Q
So really what you're talking about is it, it's,
3
4
it's always sort of been there, the community caring
approach --
5
6
A
Q
That's right.
-- is what you talked about before being similar,
7
good social worker practice.
8
9
A
Q
That's right.
Sort of the same thing but now it's more
10
11
12
systematic?
A That's -- it's more systematic, it's, it's
supported more by the institution.
13
14
Q
A
Yeah.
And in the case of west region, which you raised,
15
they actually did do this, although it was not talked about
16
as differential response at the time.
They set up what
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
they called a treatment support unit which did exactly
what I'm talking about in terms of family enhancement
services.
MR. OLSON: Okay. Maybe, maybe if it suits you,
Mr. Commissioner, we could take the mid-morning break now
and ...
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes, that's fine. We'll
adjourn for 15 minutes.
25
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
(BRIEF RECESS)
2
3
THE COMMISSIONER: Mr. Olson.
4
MR. OLSON:
Madam Clerk, could we put on the
5
screen page 102.
I think, I think you're on the page.
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
Right there is perfect.
THE COMMISSIONER: What page is this?
MR. OLSON: This is page 102.
THE COMMISSIONER: Right.
MR. OLSON: And right above the defining
differential response, you see the heading there, just
above that.
13
14
BY MR. OLSON:
15
Q
This is still under where you were talking about
16
the protection, criticisms of the protection model?
17
18
A
Q
Right.
And here you're talking about trends, criticisms
19
of the child protection system and you cite overinclusion:
20
21
22
23
24
25
"Overinclusion - some
families are unnecessarily
referred to child protection
services;
capacity - the number of
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3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
families referred exceeds the
system's capacity to respond
appropriately;
underinclusion - some
families who should receive
services do not;
service delivery - some
families are referred
appropriately and receive
services, but not necessarily
the right type of services;
and
service orientation - the
authoritative approach of
child protection services is
not appropriate for many
families who are referred."
18
19
20
A
Q
Right.
Those are all criticisms of the protection,
21
traditional protection approach to service delivery?
22
A
That's correct.
23
24
Q Okay. And so differ, the differential response
approach is meant to address some of those?
25
A
Some of those.
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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2
3
Q
A
Q
Okay. Not necessarily all of them?
No.
One of, one or two of them I think it is meant to
4
5
address, you indicated, were over-inclusion and capacity;
is that right?
6
A
Well, capacity is, I mean you need resources to
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
address capacity or you need to narrow the range of
families that are served. So differential response doesn't
necessarily address, in and of itself, doesn't necessarily
address the capacity as your capacity has to be there in
order to provide effective differential response services.
Q Okay. Dr. Trocmé, and you're familiar with Dr.
Trocmé?
14
15
A
Q
Right.
He's, he testified and, was it either yesterday
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
or the day before, I can't remember now --
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Three days ago.
MR. OLSON: Three days ago, I'm told.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Two.
MS. WALSH: Two.
THE CLERK: No, Tuesday.
MR. OLSON: Oh, okay, Tuesday. He did testify
23
here, I can assure you that.
Exhibit 111, if we could put
24
that on a screen.
It was a PowerPoint, a PowerPoint
25
presentation, slide 115. So that's 115. One one five.
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1
THE CLERK:
Just trying to figure out how to get
2
it.
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
MR. OLSON: If you scroll down. If you go back
to where you were.
THE CLERK: (Inaudible) go back?
MR. OLSON: Okay, just drag the ...
THE CLERK: Fifteen or 115?
MR. OLSON: Fifteen, sorry. There you are.
Okay. That's, that's the one I want.
10
11
BY MR. OLSON:
12
Q
If you look at this slide, it shows the children
13
in --
14
15
16
THE COMMISSIONER: Page 15, is it?
MR. OLSON: Yeah, slide 15, page 15.
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes.
17
18
19
BY MR. OLSON:
Q The slide shows in 1992 there were 30,000
20
children in care in Canada.
And then if you go to 2007 it
21
shows there were just over 70,000 children in care.
22
23
A
Q
Right.
So it's showing that there's been a dramatic
24
increase in the cumber of children in care.
Is this sort
25
of the problem with what was happening with the protection
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
stream, that children were being apprehended very
frequently or large number of children were being
apprehended?
4
A
Well, the factors leading to that increased trend
5
6
7
that you see, and the trends will vary depending on the
sources of information, but they're driven, driven by
changes in legislation and changes in policy as well as
8
sort of children being apprehended.
And, yes, it's
9
10
11
12
13
14
children being apprehended but, but some of the ways in
which legislation has been changed have, have led to that.
For example, the definition of child protection has
expanded to include things like intimate partner violence
and sort of exposure to intimate partner violence, and so
that opens up a whole new area of potential neglect that
15
child welfare agencies are responding to.
That's just one
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
example of the kind of expansion of children coming into
care lead -- some of the factors that lead to the expansion
of children coming into care.
The other possible sort of aspect of this is, of
course, you know, and I'm not -- I can't comment in detail
about this, but, you know, we become kind of risk averse in
our approach to child welfare where we refer cases
sometimes that don't need to be referred, and some of those
end up in care, at least for periods of time, when maybe
other types of approaches would, would work better.
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2
3
Q
A
Q
That's sort of the over-inclusion idea?
That's right.
Is one way to address that phenomenon is if a
4
5
6
7
8
9
child protection concern, what we're calling now a child
protection concern, where there may not be an immediate
risk to a child comes to the attention of, for example, a
school guidance counselor or something of that nature, and
it's handled at that level, maybe Child and Family Services
is made aware of it but they don't necessarily go in and
10
11
apprehend and open a file.
a, an approach to it?
Have you heard of that sort of
12
A
Yes. There, there are examples of that. There's
13
14
15
16
17
not maybe many examples of that but there are examples of
that. To go down that route, of course, you, you, you must
sort of ensure that those people have the capacity to do
those kinds of assessments and not allow children that do
need referrals to be -- to fall through the cracks, and
18
that's often a difficult thing to do.
So one has to be a
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
bit cautious about doing that but, but certainly some
mechanisms like that can help divert some families from
being referred to the child, child welfare system and avoid
maybe not so much children coming into care but avoid some
of the time that goes into investigating those cases and in
turn lead -- allow more time for actually providing
services to families.
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1
Q
Is community capacity-building a, one of the
2
major ways to reduce this number?
3
A
It's part of the answer, and, but you need to
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
also probably take a look at sort of the way in which
reporting and referral and screening occur. So what I mean
by that, for example, the better your ability is to do
assessments and actually adequately screen those that do
need to be referred and those that need investigations,
then the better service -- the more appropriate services
are going to be -- are -- that are, that are going to be
11
provided to families and children.
In other words, those
12
13
14
15
16
17
that need referral will get referred and those that need
the more family support services will get those services.
They'll get the more appropriate services with respect to
need.
Q Okay. Now, are you talking about differential
response now?
18
19
20
A
Q
A
Differential response is part of that.
Right.
But what I'm also referring to is the assessment
21
22
23
24
25
and screening process that occurs at the front end of
whether its your child welfare system or your expanded
Child and Family welfare system that might include other
agents in the community such as people in the education,
health sector and so on.
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1
2
Q Okay. I think I understand. We've heard the
terms upstream work, midstream and downstream.
3
4
A
Q
Right.
Am I getting at sort of what you're talking
5
about? Are those terms familiar to you?
6
A
Well, I think I understand them but maybe I need
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
you to brief me on how you're using those terms.
Q Okay. Well, how about you explain to me when
you're talking about someone in the education field
screening, what, what, what are you talking about when
you're saying that?
A I'm talking there about equipping those
professionals, either through training in child welfare,
that they make more accurate referrals to the services that
those families need, or setting up a system within those,
that -- an education system where those kinds of questions
would flow to people with that expertise to be able to make
18
that referral.
And I use the example of the child
19
wellbeing centres in New South Wales as an example of the
20
21
latter approach.
approaches.
So, so it would be either of those two
22
23
24
25
In the U.K. there's been quite an emphasis on
training teachers and health professionals around sort of
child protection issues so that they make better referrals.
That's an example of the former approach.
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
Q Okay. So part of that is training, people that
come into contact --
3
A
Right.
4
Q -- with young children to know how --
5
6
A
Q
Right.
-- to screen them so they can determine when it's
7
8
a child protection issue involving Child and Family
Services --
9
10
A
Q
Right.
-- and not a child protection issue involving
11
12
13
14
15
Child and Family Services?
A Right. And having information on a range of
resources to refer those families to.
Q I see. And the resources have to be out there
and accessible --
16
17
18
19
A
Q
A
Q
Right.
-- and known?
Right, yeah.
I want to move now to your evaluation of
20
differential response model that is at document, Commission
21
disclosure document number 1850.
And Mr. Commissioner,
22
that has already been filed and it's in the folder in front
23
24
of you, page 38949, for Madam Clerk.
disclosure 1850, page 38949.
So it's Commission
25
THE CLERK:
I'm just not seeing on the stick
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
where ...
2
3
4
5
6
7
MR. OLSON: It's a Commission disclosure.
THE CLERK: Right. And I don't have that. I
used to have an icon that said Phoenix Sinclair Inquiry
with all the, of 47 (inaudible). I'm not seeing that.
MS. WALSH: You don't still have that?
THE CLERK: Sorry?
8
MS. WALSH:
Do you not go into something else to
9
find that?
10
THE CLERK:
When I started the stick, which is
11
12
where I am, and I go forward, those are my choices.
MR. OLSON: What if you go under other?
13
THE CLERK:
I usually have that icon that
14
shows ...
15
16
17
18
19
20
MR. OLSON: If you back, please. Go under phase
three. Go under today's date. It might be under today's
date.
MS. WALSH: Did it usually just come up for you?
THE CLERK: It would. It was in this list at the
bottom, it said Phoenix Sinclair Inquiry.
21
MR. OLSON:
They may have put it under today's
22
23
24
date. It might just be under there. Under Mr. McKenzie --
Dr. McKenzie. Yeah, there it is. Number 78.
THE COMMISSIONER: What page number?
25
MR. OLSON:
Page number 38950 is where you'll
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
find the first page.
actual report.
That's where you'll find the, the
3
4
5
6
7
8
THE COMMISSIONER: Nine five zero.
THE CLERK: 38950.
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes.
MR. OLSON: And I just provided that reference to
the clerk so she would know where to find it in the
Commission disclosure.
9
THE COMMISSIONER:
And what page are you going
10
to?
11
MR. OLSON:
I'm not necessarily going to a page
12
13
14
15
right at this moment, but as soon as I do I will let you
know --
THE COMMISSIONER: All right.
MR. OLSON: -- Mr. Commissioner.
16
17
BY MR. OLSON:
18
Q
This is the report that you prepared to evaluate
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
the differential response evaluation project; is that
right?
A Yes. This was the evaluation of the pilot
projects initiated under that phase of the rollout of
differential response in the province.
Q Okay. Can you tell the Commissioner just a
little bit about that project and what it was?
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2
3
4
5
6
7
A Okay. Well, each authority was allocated funds
for developing pilot projects in differential response to
test out a differential response model, and this phase
roughly lasted from the latter part of 2009 to March of
2011, at which time there was a rollout of differential
response funding to all agencies in the system. And during
this pilot phase, projects were developed in various
8
communities or various agencies to test out the model.
In
9
10
11
12
13
the case of the general authority, I think there were six
projects funded in six different agencies and the
particular focus was on creating a family enhancement
stream that I earlier described and providing more
intensive family support services to families referred to
14
that stream of service.
And this was an evaluation of
15
those services over that period of time.
16
Q
I see. Were the workers that were recruited into
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
this project, were they doing just family enhancement?
A The workers that were included into those
projects at the time, yes, were primarily doing, in all
cases doing family enhancement services during the pilot
phase. So yes, that was the case.
Q Okay. So they weren't doing any protection,
any ...
24
25
A
Q
They weren't doing protection.
Okay. How many years of experience did they have
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
in, on average? I, I --
2
A
On average, about 10 years' experience so they
3
4
5
were probably somewhat more experienced staff than, than
you, than, than those generally in the child welfare
system.
6
Q
In terms of conducting the evaluation itself,
7
what was the process?
8
A
It was a mixed methods approach to a valuation in
9
that we did file reviews, completed file reviews of those
10
families that were referred and received service.
We
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
interviewed a sample of parents, so family care-givers. We
did, we interviewed service collaterals, that is, partners
from the communities where these projects were located, and
we collected statistical and document evidence of, of
service that was provided during -- of services that were
provided during this time period.
Q Okay. Can you tell me what the caseload of each
worker was on average?
19
A
I can't tell you the exact average but the
20
21
22
23
24
25
maximum caseload at the latter stage of it was, in, in
places like Winnipeg, approached 20, but it was fewer than
that in the other sites, so probably averaged, you know, 12
to 15 as I recall.
Q Okay. Now, if we look at the bottom of page
38961, so that's 38961.
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2
3
You indicate that the family care-givers who were
interviewed responded overwhelmingly positively to the
services that were offered?
4
5
A
Q
That's correct.
Okay. This was due, as you indicate, to the high
6
7
levels of family engagement and positive working
relationships?
8
9
A
Q
Right.
And that, we'll find that on page 38963 if we
10
want the reference.
11
12
A
Q
Right.
I also understand that the community service
13
14
agencies were unanimous in their support for the expansion
of the service model?
15
A
That's correct.
16
17
Q Okay. Now, you have a summary at 39015. Under
the first paragraph under the summary 4.9 you indicate:
18
19
20
21
22
23
"... a significant number of
families referred have
difficulties that would have
required at least some level of
protection related services in the
24
absence of an FE option.
Although
25
only 18% of files were classified
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
in the high or very high range on
the PFH tool, ..."
3
4
P-H -- sorry, PFH is a probability of future
5
harm?
6
7
8
9
10
11
A
Q
That's correct. Um-hum.
"... outcomes appear to suggest
that families with higher risk can
be served by these programs as
long as program staff prioritize
12
child safety concerns,
and are
13
14
prepared to take actions to ensure
this if child safety becomes an
15
immediate concern.
However, this
16
raises an important dilemma.
If
17
18
19
20
21
22
[family enhancement] programs are
modified to include a higher
number of referrals from families
at greater risk, will this
overshadow the focus on early
intervention to families?"
23
24
25
A
Q
Right.
Now, why do you say that?
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
A
Well, first of all, I want to point out what I
2
mean -- what the interpretation of high or very high risk
3
here is.
High or very high risk doesn't mean that the
4
safety of the child is, is of immediate concern.
What it
5
reports on is the future probability of a reoccurrence of,
6
of child neglect or abuse.
And if you, if you only have
7
8
9
10
11
limited capacity in your system to provide these services,
if you focus more and more on those range of families
which, you know, one can make a strong argument that that
should be the case, you then reduce the ability to take
what we might say are softer referrals where needs exist
12
but they are not at the same level of risk.
In other
13
words, they would be more likely to fall into the low and
14
moderate risk families.
So, you know, some of those
15
16
17
18
19
families may need those types of services in order to
prevent future reoccurrence or a referral for child
maltreatment or a future referral for that, but those would
not be able to be served because of capacity limitations.
That's what I'm referring to.
20
Q
When you're talking about capacity, are you
21
22
talking about resources?
A I'm talking about staff resources, yes --
23
24
Q
A
Okay.
-- in this particular model. And staff resources
25
here within the child welfare agency.
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2
3
4
Q Okay. It's sort of you have to pick your
battles. Is that what it boils down to --
A You have to pick your --
Q -- I hate to put it that way but --
5
6
7
A
Q
A
Yeah.
-- that's what it sounds like you're saying.
Well, you have to pick your battles or find ways
8
9
10
11
12
of increasing capacity.
Q Okay. So in order for the D.R. model to work, I
think you said before its services have to be intense, that
is, workers have to have the time to spend with the
families?
13
14
A
Q
Right.
And they have to be, it has to be, you know,
15
regular contact?
16
A
Right.
17
18
Q Okay. So if workers are dealing with families
that require a lot of contact, they take up more time?
19
20
A
Q
They do.
And is that what you're getting at here, if
21
22
23
you're providing services to those types of families that
are going to take a lot of time, you're not going to be
able to handle as many families?
24
A
Well, your case -- the workloads have to be
25
manageable to make this model of more intensive services
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
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2
3
work, and that's generally true in the, in the child
welfare system overall, but particularly for this program
where there's a lot of face-to-face counseling services and
4
support services with families, it's doubly true.
And so
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
that, that needs to be -- the ability to provide those
services need to be there.
Now, it's important to note that if you provide
more intensive services at the front end of providing these
services, those services, and we found evidence of this,
become less frequent over time and so the intensity of
services is not something that continues on forever but it
12
is important, particularly at the front end.
And if you
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
take families of higher risk, the chances are you're going
to -- the likelihood is you're going to need to provide
services for a somewhat longer period of time than, say,
three months, six months or so.
Q Okay. Is the idea also that if you can get to
families now, deal with the issues, get them, you know, the
treatment or services or whatever it is that they need, you
may prevent them from coming into contact later on and
needing --
22
23
A
Q
Absolutely.
-- greater level of services and eventually it's
24
25
going to cost more, it's going to affect the family more,
it's going to -- children are going to be worse off?
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
A
Q
That's absolutely correct.
Dr. Trocmé, during his testimony, I think he used
3
4
analogy of it doesn't make sense to provide children with
a, a half a dose of an antibiotic or --
5
6
A
Q
Correct.
-- use half measures. Is that something you, you
7
would agree with?
8
A
Generally, I would agree with that.
9
Q Can the differential response be provided with --
10
be provided by people other than social workers?
I mean,
11
12
13
can, can case aides or support workers meet with the
families and provide the work that would normally be
provided by the social worker?
14
A
I would sort of describe it as more of a team-
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
oriented service that needs to be in place so, for example,
even in the differential response model that I looked at
here within the general authority, family support workers
who were not trained social workers were a part of the team
that provided important services to families, so it really
demands very skilled expertise in terms of family
counseling and supportive engagement services that social
workers are, you know -- I mean they may not be the only
ones that can provide that but they are important aspects
24
of providing that service.
But there are roles also for
25
other, other staff and workers as well as part of this kind
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
of approach.
2
Q
Were workers under the old model -- we've heard
3
4
that workers were going from sort of a -- it was a crisis
response approach.
5
6
A
Q
Right.
Workers are going from crisis to crisis but never
7
really getting to deal with the problems that were facing
8
9
the families.
you, you heard?
Is that something that you were aware of or
10
11
12
13
14
A
Q
A
Q
approach?
Yes.
Do you know if that's still happening today?
Oh, sure. Yes.
Is that even happening now that there's this new
15
16
A Well, yeah. It's happening in some
jurisdictions, perhaps more than others, because of --
17
18
Q
Manitoba.
And I'm talking specifically in Winnipeg and in
19
20
A Okay. Well, you know, there have been
significant increases in funding that have allowed for the
21
expansion of the workforce so that's helped.
But that
22
23
doesn't mean that in certain communities the referrals
outweigh the, the number of staff there able to respond to
24
situations.
And in some aboriginal communities that's
25
particularly true, and they are still overwhelmed with the
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
number of referrals for child protection concerns.
Q Okay. Do you know what the situation is in
Winnipeg right now?
4
5
A
right now.
I wouldn't be able to comment on that, you know,
6
7
Q Okay. We heard evidence from the Winnipeg CEO,
Alana Brownlee --
8
9
A
Q
Right.
She told us that the total differential response
10
budget per family is $1300 per year.
11
12
13
14
15
16
A
Q
A
Q
A
Q
Right.
Are you aware of that budget?
No.
I don't know if you are or not.
No.
She told us that that wasn't, was not nearly
17
18
enough to provide adequate family enhancement services for
a family. What are your thoughts on that?
19
A
I think she's absolutely accurate, and that
20
21
22
23
24
25
family enhancement services under the differential response
model have, have demonstrated their, their effectiveness
but we are still not serving enough families and probably
with enough intensive services that is possible, and I'll
give you an example.
In Minnesota, for example, about 66 percent of
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
families referred to child welfare are served through a
family enhancement stream of service.
3
4
Q
A
Okay.
So I think the model needs to be expanded.
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
Q Needs to be expanded. Terms of -- forgetting
about the amount of money for a minute, $1300 or whatever
it is, is there a way or, or a way you can see that might
help sort of stretch, stretch the dollar further than it
might otherwise go? Way to use services to expand? And we
touched on it a bit talking about efficiencies, but is
there any other recommendations you can make in that
regard?
13
A
Well, I think that we need to look carefully at
14
15
16
17
our child welfare system to see whether we can reduce the,
what I refer to as the administrative burden that involves
child welfare workers spending over half their time
sometimes completing forms and following sort of
18
procedures.
Procedures are important but, but whether the
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
amount of time spent on those kinds of things can be
reduced so that more of that time could be used for
providing direct casework services to families I think is
one answer to making those dollars stretch further.
I think we can become somewhat more effective as
the current approach is in doing assessments and developing
a new practice approach that actually can be more efficient
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
6
than the older ways in which we were doing those kinds of
assessments and case planning, reducing the amount of time
that can be -- that is spent on recording; developing
greater efficiency and maybe the referral process that
would result in somewhat less time being spent on
investigation and more of that time being spent on serving
7
families.
Working more collaboratively with the community
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
agencies are other ways in which we can maximize some of
the resources that are currently being provided for child
and family wellbeing in our community.
MR. OLSON: Okay. If we could put page 39081 on
the screen. And it's the last paragraph. You were almost
there. There it is. Results -- oh, yeah, that's it.
Issues pertaining to the recommendation -- sorry,
recommended.
You have -- you've written -- do you have that,
Mr. Commissioner?
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes.
19
20
BY MR. OLSON:
21
22
23
24
25
Q
You wrote:
"Issues pertaining to the
recommended caseload size for
[differential response family
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B.D. MCKENZIE - DR.EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
enhancement] were identified in
2
Section 9.1.
Based on feedback
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
from the Winnipeg [Child and
Family Services] pilot site, both
from staff and service
collaterals, current caseloads,
which are approximately 20, are
too high to realize the full
benefits from the DR service
model. A caseload of 12 to 15
active family cases was suggested.
It may be that this number could
increase marginally if it includes
some cases that are receiving
infrequent contact."
16
17
Then you go on to note that:
18
19
20
21
22
"... caseload counts alone are not
a good basis for assessing
workload, particularly if these
are compared across programs."
23
24
Et cetera.
25
Now, in terms of caseload, we've heard from Ms.
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2
Brownlee that caseload hasn't changed all that much from
what it was before.
3
A
Right.
4
5
6
7
8
9
Q Pre the introduction of the D.R. model. Is that
something you're aware of?
A Yes. I, I know the formula that's used for
funding family enhancement services.
Q Okay. In terms of delivering an effective D.R.
model, what is your view as to -- I mean, you say caseload
10
11
here, you're talking about caseload 12 to 15.
something you stand by?
Is that
12
A
Yeah. I would stick pretty closely to that. And
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
I use the term "active cases", so I'm talking about cases
that are referred more at the more intensive service level,
and when I said maybe somewhat larger -- or somewhat higher
than that, if you are carrying cases that don't require as
intensive, you know, the same degree of intensity and
service perhaps it could edge up a little bit to sort of
the 18 range or so on, but, but I would stick pretty close
to the maximum of 15 active cases and I still believe
that's, that to be the appropriate level.
Q Okay. And does your view change if it's the
workers doing both protection cases and differential
response cases?
25
A
No, probably should be the same.
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Q
Should be the same? And what, what if the worker
2
3
4
is using a, a, you know, a support person to meet with the
family and do the differential response type work rather
than doing that work him or herself?
5
A
Well, I think a support worker does somewhat
6
7
8
9
different services than the differential response social
worker does or provides somewhat different services, but it
might make some difference if those kinds of intensive
services were available.
10
Q
We touched on it before, but in terms of a
11
12
13
response to the workload demands, is it -- would it be
appropriate to have anyone other than the social worker
doing the differential response type work?
14
A
Well, differential response is, is -- or, you
15
16
know, these services again, I would emphasize, is not
something different -- or not something that only one
17
worker does.
It really is sort of, I've referred to the
18
19
20
21
sort of important role of community collaterals or
community partners play, and those might be from other
agencies that are formal -- that are government agencies.
They might be from non-government organizations that are
22
sort of contracted to work with those families.
They play
23
important roles in providing this service, as well.
In
24
25
some cases those services might be provided as part of the
ongoing responsibility of another government department or
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1
another agency.
In other cases there may need to be
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
funding provided to assist those agencies in providing some
of those services that should be a part of the differential
response system.
Q Okay. One of the key elements of the D.R.
system, I think, is you said one of the key things that
distinguishes it from the old model was the training
component?
9
10
A
Q
Yes.
That was essential for social workers to get that
11
specialized training?
12
13
A
Q
Right.
Is any part of that training focused on how to
14
15
engage collaterals, work with, you know, third parties in
getting the services and connecting with the community?
16
A
Well, I'm not the, the expert on the sort of
17
18
19
20
training model that has evolved but I think some aspects of
that training, yes, involve building what we would call
safety networks that include other agencies and other
partners in the community, so that's a part of that
21
process.
And, but, but developing that training and that
22
23
practice approach, you know, is really essential within the
child welfare system because of its interface with
24
questions of safety and risk.
And so that, that's where a
25
part of that is, but a part of it certainly does involve
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2
3
4
engaging with other community partners and, and is
important to be a part of that training approach.
Q Okay. Do you know if that training is a part of
the current training program?
5
6
7
A
Q
A
My understanding is that it is.
Okay.
And that the new practice model involves both
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
training in a suite of assessment tools but it also
involves approaches to what we call safety-oriented
practice, which uses material around sort of looking at
safety and how to map and how to engage with other service
providers in, in assisting in that process, bringing those
groups together to case conference and so on.
Q Okay. Thank you. If we could put page number
39047 on the monitor. So that's 39047. Right there.
Perfect. Under the heading, summary. It's about eight
lines from the bottom, near the end of the sentence, where
it says, a family's. Says:
19
20
21
22
23
"A family's willingness to engage
emerges as the most important
element in achieving a successful
outcome."
24
25
This is talking about in using the differential
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response model?
2
3
A
Q
Yes.
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
"Perhaps this is not surprising
but it does connect to another
observation made by several
respondents about the possibility
of accepting more high risk cases.
This is a question that needs to
be carefully considered in that
many families already referred to
[family enhancement] units do have
protection related concerns, and
if intake is restricted to high
risk cases it will have the effect
of reducing the number of families
with a lower risk profile who have
significant 'need' for more family
support services."
20
21
22
23
24
Now, I think that's particularly relevant in
this, in the case before us because we saw where Samantha
Kematch wasn't always receptive to Child and Family
Services' involvement in her life.
25
A
Okay.
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1
Q
And she sort of tried to avoid the service, and
2
the agency didn't always come back.
How, how do you get
3
4
5
someone like that to be engaged with the system so they
don't fall through the cracks, so someone like Phoenix
doesn't fall through the cracks?
6
A
Well, I earlier referred to sort of different
7
8
9
10
tiers of what I would talk about as a pyramid of services
that should be provided for enhancing child and family
welfare in our communities and I talked about the universal
and then sort of tiers of the early intervention services
11
where we need targeted programs.
And those targeted
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
programs might be a part of family enhancement within, from
-- offered within the child welfare system, it might
include other targeted programs that are also provided by
the community, and for some of these families and this,
this mother might fall into that category, the issue of
whether the services are provided on a voluntary basis or
not is sometimes a moot point. The, the service might have
to be involuntary, and that would involve either the child
welfare agency or some other agency providing those
services to the family, or the matter would be referred
directly for an investigation and the child, if safety is a
23
threat, would be taken into care.
And so some of these
24
25
sort of targeted programs can be voluntary and, and some
family enhancement services can be voluntary, and some can
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2
be somewhat -- there's a certain involuntary nature to some
of those services.
3
4
Q
A
Right.
Kind of take it or leave it.
5
6
7
8
Q Right. Your example of the pyramid, in talking
about levels of the services, we've, we heard that there
was some involvement with the family with community
organizations like Ma Mawi, places like that, Andrews
9
Street Centre.
Those would be examples of the services
10
that families might get -- community-based services from --
11
12
A
Q
Right.
-- the prevention services that, that are there
13
before there's ever any engage --
14
15
A
Q
Possibly.
-- possibly ever an engagement with the child
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
welfare system.
A That's correct. And you know, those, those
services are important for many families but because they
tend to be voluntary, because they, they miss those
families that are unwilling to engage on a voluntary basis
and in some cases those services aren't effectively
coordinated with the child welfare service -- child welfare
agency to make sure that families don't fall through the
cracks.
Q Okay. But engagement in social inclusion,
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1
2
inclusion in the community, those are ways of getting at
those young children who otherwise aren't seen?
3
4
5
A
Q
A
Absolutely.
Okay.
And if I can add one more thing to that, I would
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
say to you that I think our services in that area, those
specially-targeted programs that support families, are not,
are under-developed in, in our province and we need to do
more of that, and the greater the level of poverty and
inequality the more we need those special targeted
programs.
Q Okay. That, that actually takes me to the next
question I was going to ask you, or the next area I was
going to go to, which was the recommendation you make at
page 39090, 39090, which was that -- we don't necessarily
need to go there, but that was that you recommend in your
evaluation that there's a need for more comprehensive
prevention and you call it early intervention strategy for
child and, child and welfare services. Is that what you're
talking about there?
A That's exactly what I'm referring to. I think
that we do have a range of universal programs that are
23
generally available to families.
They're not always as
24
coordinated as they should be, and you referred to that
25
earlier in your question.
I think that's an aspect that
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2
needs to be considered. We need an improved range of those
specially-targeted family support services than we
3
currently have.
We have a number of those, and family
4
5
6
7
8
9
enhancement services are a way of building that into the
child welfare system but we need to expand those services
both within and outside the child welfare system.
Q Okay. Terms of your recommendations, at page
39091, and I'll take you there, in the large paragraph,
starting on:
10
11
12
"Significant and positive changes
to ANCR's services ..."
13
14
15
A
Q
Right.
You talk about ANCR having the differential
16
response, the short 90, 90-day differential response model.
17
18
A
Q
Right.
And you suggest that one, one problem with that
19
is that it's just too short a period.
20
21
A
Q
Right.
And once you build up rapport with the worker, by
22
the time that's done, a lot of the cases you're shifting to
23
a new worker to get at D.R. services.
That doesn't
24
25
necessarily make a lot of sense.
basically saying?
Is that what you're
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2
3
4
5
6
A Yes, that's what I'm referring to. That sort of
flies in the face of what we would say would be best
practice approach in providing, you know, intensive family
support services to families to disrupt that service while
the transfer occurs and then have it picked up, oftentimes
with certain amounts of delay.
7
Q
And so your recommendation there would be to move
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
it all into Child and Family Services or ...
A Well, I actually discussed in the report
different approaches to that, and if we wanted to be a
purist on this, family enhancement services located within
the child welfare system should be actually located as
close to the intake process as possible. But because we've
moved to a sort of authority determination process for
transferring cases, it didn't seem that allowing those
cases to -- they could be cases that require more than 90
days be retained by ANCR and provided service until the end
18
19
of that.
families.
That would be another possible option for those
But because of the way we've set up an intake
20
21
22
23
24
25
system in this province, that didn't seem to be very
practical so this might be an alternative way of avoiding
that disruption in service.
Now, there may be other ways of addressing that.
For example, if you could accurately screen the cases that
only required 90 days and reduce the number of referrals
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after that period of time, that might be another way of, of
2
dealing with that.
At the time that this review was done,
3
4
5
6
7
32 percent of the cases that were referred to Winnipeg were
coming from ANCR family enhancement program, so that was
quite a large number of families that were requiring more
than the 90 days, and so that was the nature of why this
discussion and recommendation was made.
8
Q
Right.
9
10
A It may be different now. That was only up until
March 2011.
11
Q
I would suspect that one of the problems with the
12
13
screening is that other issues might emerge that go beyond
the 90 days and ...
14
A
It's very hard to predict, yeah.
15
16
17
18
Q Yeah. We've heard some evidence that one of the
impacts of the SDM tools is the higher workload due to
additional paperwork, and that's something you comment on
in --
19
A
Right.
20
21
22
Q -- your evaluation. One of the things that you
stated is that the strengths and needs assessment be
performed by family enhancement workers.
23
A
Right.
24
25
Q Okay. If ANCR was to become solely a tier one
intake function, do you think it would be beneficial to
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2
transfer the strengths and needs assessment to family
enhancement workers?
3
A
Well, the strengths and needs assessment really
4
5
6
requires a, and I'm not sure of the number of days, but it
requires a bit more time to gather that information from
families, so it depends on the tier one intake time period
7
as to whether that could be done by ANCR or not.
So
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
depending on what that intake window is, it may or may not
be possible.
Q Okay. What about the -- I guess it would be the
same thing with the probability of future harm assessment?
A Yeah. That's a little easier to do in a shorter
period of time but, but it still requires time, yeah.
Q Okay. Just in terms of the relationship-building
process, would those, those assessments, the, the
probability of future harm and the strengths and needs
assessment, are they part of that process?
18
A
They're part of the, the structured decision-
19
making tools.
20
21
Q
A
Right.
And if we look at this, there's really a suite of
22
23
24
tools. There's the safety assessment, the risk assessment,
and then the strengths and needs assessment leading to a
case plan.
25
Q
Yeah, I'm just thinking in terms of building
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rapport, getting to know the client --
2
A
Yes.
3
Q -- spending time --
4
5
A
Q
Yes, yes.
-- with the client.
6
7
A Yes. They are --
Q The more of that you do the more --
8
9
10
A
Q
They are a part of that process.
They are. Okay.
Just in terms of providing effective differential
11
response, I just want to make sure I have the requirements
12
down.
There's the -- one, one of the requirements is to
13
have the right assessment tools?
14
15
16
A
Q
A
Right.
And that, we talked about the SDM tools?
The SDM tools are a part of that but it goes
17
18
19
beyond SDM.
Q Okay. And what, what is beyond the SDM in terms
of assessment tools?
20
A
That would be sort of developing safety-oriented
21
22
23
24
practice approaches that could be used and kind of
assessing the willingness-to-work piece of what I referred
to as being important for doing effective family
enhancement services.
25
Q
Okay. You need -- you also said you need workers
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that are properly trained to use the tools?
2
3
4
A
Q
A
Right.
And that has to be intensive adequate training?
Right.
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
Q Okay. Then you need the workers who have the
ability to provide intensive service to families?
A Yes. Going back to the tools, they need to be
trained in the use of the tools, but let's remember that
those are only tools and what is, you know, they must be
supplemented with good, sound clinical judgment and an
ability to do an assessment of, of what's needed for
families, and it goes beyond the sort of knowledge of the
tools in order to do that, and then, of course, the skills
to actually do the practise.
Q Right. Not -- it's just a tool, at the end of
the day?
17
18
19
A
Q
A
That's right.
That's all it is.
There -- that's right. They help but they're not
20
21
22
the full answer.
Q Right. So tools, training, ability to provide
intensive service and focus services?
23
A
And, and good clinical knowledge and skills.
24
25
Q Good clinical knowledge and skills. Then you
also need the family's willing to be engaged with the
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2
3
4
workers?
A
Q
A
Right.
That requires some trust in the system?
Well, it requires some trust and, and let's be
5
6
7
8
9
10
honest about this, not every family starts off with that so
sometimes it's the worker's skills in how to facilitate
engagement that's an important part of their training and
ability to provide service.
Q Okay. And then, of course, you need the
resources, both in --
11
12
13
14
15
A
Q
at large?
A
Q
Right.
-- Child and Family Services and in the community
That's right.
Okay. Just want to refer you to 18 -- Commission
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
disclosure 1850, I believe. This would be page number --
this is, first of all, you'll see on page number 39090 --
sorry, 389089 (sic) will give you that -- that's the title
page.
THE COMMISSIONER: Three eight nine.
MR. OLSON: 389089.
THE CLERK: 39089.
THE COMMISSIONER: Three nine ...
24
MR. OLSON:
Well, let's go to 39092 is the
25
actual, is the page I want.
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3
4
5
6
THE COMMISSIONER: Three nine ...
MR. OLSON: Sorry, 39092. This, this is a page
from an article you authored with Audra Taylor and Scott
Maximus.
THE COMMISSIONER: 39092?
MR. OLSON: Yeah, 39092.
7
THE COMMISSIONER:
Well, that's the next page
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
after we -- the one we've just been discussing?
THE WITNESS: Yes. It's part of the evaluation.
It's not an article.
THE COMMISSIONER: We've just been through
working on 39091.
Maybe I've, maybe I've got it wrong.
THE CLERK: (Inaudible) Scott's last name.
THE WITNESS: Sorry?
THE CLERK: Scott's last name?
THE WITNESS: Maximus?
THE CLERK: Maximus?
THE WITNESS: Yeah. It's on the front of the
evaluation, the document that you have.
MR. OLSON: Okay. That's -- you're quite
correct, Mr. Commissioner, my -- I have a document that's
just, the pages are a little bit disorganized, but it is
the next page.
THE COMMISSIONER: 39092.
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2
MR. OLSON: 39092.
THE COMMISSIONER: Okay.
3
4
BY MR. OLSON:
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Q
A
Q
Under the final recommendation, says:
"The final recommendation
recognizes that DR is not, by
itself, an adequate response to
the need for early intervention
and prevention services for
families where child welfare
concerns exist."
Right.
"Although it is recognized that a
number of such services do exist
these need to be expanded and more
effectively coordinated to meet
the needs of Manitoba families.
Manitoba has the highest rate of
children in care among the ten
Canadian provinces, ..."
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3
4
What you're saying is there, that you're talking
about when you look at the pyramid again, it's those
services at the bottom of the pyramid all the way up that
need to be --
5
6
7
8
A
Q
A
Right.
-- expanded?
Yes.
MR. OLSON: Okay. Those, those are my questions
9
10
11
12
for this witness, Mr. Commissioner.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right. Thank you, Mr.
Olson.
MR. OLSON: Thank you.
13
14
Are there any?
THE COMMISSIONER:
Now, who else has questions?
15
16
17
18
MR. MCKINNON: It's 12:21, Mr. Commissioner, if I
could have the lunch break to confer with my client and
prepare a few questions I think I could shorten the time I
might be at the podium.
19
20
to 1:45, then.
THE COMMISSIONER:
Well, perhaps we could adjourn
21
MR. MCKINNON: That would be fine with me.
22
23
24
this afternoon.
THE COMMISSIONER:
MR. MCKINNON: Okay.
Because we've got the panel
25
THE COMMISSIONER: All right. We'll adjourn till
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B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
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1:45 now, then. Stand adjourned.
2
3
(LUNCHEON RECESS)
4
5
THE COMMISSIONER: Is your clock on?
6
7
THE CLERK:
that's a good sign.
I still can't hear anything but
8
9
10
THE COMMISSIONER: That's progress.
MR. MCKINNON: Signs of life.
THE CLERK: Yeah. I still can't hear anything.
11
12
Okay, it's -- oh, out again.
back.
Hopefully it will come right
13
14
THE COMMISSIONER: Are we all right?
THE CLERK: (Inaudible).
15
16
THE COMMISSIONER:
a second run at it.
All right, Mr. McKinnon, take
17
18
Mr. Commissioner.
MR. MCKINNON: Okay, I'll start over. Thank you,
19
20
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR. MCKINNON:
21
Q
For the record, my name is Gordon McKinnon and
22
I'm the lawyer for the department, which includes Winnipeg
23
Child and Family Services.
Just want to explore a couple
24
25
of themes with you, Dr. McKenzie.
When you spoke this morning in response to
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1
questions from Mr. Olson, you spoke about your community
2
caring model.
We've heard some evidence at this inquiry
3
from an individual named Felix Walker who runs an
4
5
organization called NCN.
and his organization?
Are you familiar with Mr. Walker
6
7
A
Q
No.
He spoke about -- this is in a First Nations
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
community, a northern Manitoba reserve community, and he
spoke about having a program that included a wellness
centre, it included a public health centre, it included a
diabetes initiative, it included therapists and counseling
services and Child and Family Services - there was a long
list - recreation and fitness centre, all wrapped into one.
Would that be an example of what you are talking about when
you're, when you're suggesting a community caring model or
16
17
building community capacity?
thing you had in mind?
Would that be the type of
18
A
That example would certainly fit and there may be
19
20
many different models about how you get there, but that one
certainly would fit.
21
Q
And if I were to suggest to you that what's
22
23
24
needed to make that work is strong leadership in the
community and an economic base, would you agree with that,
too?
25
A
There's -- it needs more than that but those are
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3
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7
8
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10
two essential ingredients.
Q Thank you. And again, when Mr. Olson was asking
you about the components of a differential response model
and you spoke about the two streams, one where there was no
safety risk and there could be a referral to perhaps some
community agencies and some service being provided by the
organization, by the Child and Family Services agency
itself, that was one stream, and the other stream you
referred to is if there's safety concerns it's more of a
traditional protection route, correct?
11
12
A
Q
Correct.
And you said that in either stream, but including
13
14
15
16
in the protection route, it was your view that it was
possible to program or initiate programming that would --
or a practice model that would allow the worker to support
the family, engage with the family and work
17
collaboratively.
That's possible even in the protection
18
stream, in your view?
19
20
A
Q
Yes, it is.
And we heard evidence at this inquiry from Alana
21
22
Brownlee and a leading practice specialist named Karen
McDonald, I don't know if you know either --
23
A
Right.
24
Q -- or both of those --
25
A
I do.
- 102 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
Q -- individuals. You do? And they spoke about a
program that they're operating at Winnipeg CFS which is
3
4
based upon signs of safety practice techniques.
familiar with that practice model?
Are you
5
6
A
Q
I am.
And would you agree with me that that's the kind
7
8
9
10
of family engagement techniques that you were referring to
as being best practice?
A It is. It's what I refer to as part of the
safety-oriented practice approach.
11
Q
And when Mr. Olson asked you what's new about
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20
21
differential response and you gave him a very detailed
answer, I won't ask you to repeat that, but we ran into a
situation or we witnessed in the evidence in this inquiry a
situation where, in the Phoenix Sinclair case file, the
file was closed on numerous occasions, and the, and the
grounds for the closure were, no immediate protection
concerns. And my, my question for you and my suggestion to
you is that under the differential response practice model,
this concept of no immediate protection concerns doesn't
end agency involvement in a file, does it?
22
A
No. In fact, you know, that decision may be made
23
24
25
but there may be services provided to ensure that that kind
of thing doesn't occur in the future, and that's the whole
purpose of a family enhancement model.
- 103 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
Q
And, and we heard evidence again from Alan
2
3
4
5
6
Brownlee and Karen McDonald that in, in -- if that kind of
situation were to occur today, a safety assessment would be
done and a probability of future harm assessment would be
done, and if there were risk factors present services would
be provided even if there were no immediate safety
7
concerns.
Is that your understanding of one of the things
8
that's new about differential response?
9
10
A
Q
Yes.
And Mr. Olson was asking you about the concept
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12
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14
15
16
of, of over-inclusion, and you spoke I think quite
eloquently about that and I don't disagree with anything
you said, but you, according to my notes, you said you need
to look, you need to ensure that you're essentially
identifying the right people to go into the correct stream
for service.
17
18
A
Q
Right.
And would you agree with me that what's important
19
to do that is, is good assessment tools?
20
A
Right.
21
22
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25
Q And you're family -- I shouldn't say you are --
are you familiar with the new assessment tools that are
being used in, in the general authority and in Winnipeg
CFS, the safety assessment and the probability of future
harm assessment?
- 104 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
A
Q
A
Q
Yes.
And those are structured decision-making tools?
Yes.
And would those, in your view, be examples of
5
6
good tools that would help identify the correct service
stream?
7
8
A
Q
They would.
And you spoke about social workers perhaps having
9
too much emphasis on recording and keeping file notes and
10
that sort of thing.
Would you agree with me that with
11
12
13
14
15
respect to the risk assessment tools that are now being
used at Winnipeg CFS, the structured decision-making tools,
that they have the advantage of focusing the workers
clearly on what the true risk factors are and, to that
extent, that's an improvement?
16
A
Yes, but I would want to qualify that a little
17
18
19
20
21
bit by saying the tools are very important in developing
that focus but you do need to go beyond that in determining
factors that might lie outside the, the range of those
tools to determine sort of what action you need to take as
a response to those, that assessment information.
22
Q
And that's where the case planning and strengths
23
24
and needs assessment and good clinical skills come into
play?
25
A
Exactly.
- 105 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
Q Okay. And we heard evidence as well from Alana
Brownlee and Karen McDonald and at risk of boring the
Commissioner to death, he heard evidence about the
4
training.
But are you familiar with the new training
5
that's in place at Winnipeg CFS amongst others?
6
7
A
Q
Generally familiar, yes.
And would you agree again that that's giving
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
workers the kind of training they need to make those very
decisions we just spoke about?
A Yes. And one of the important elements of that
is the combination of the safety oriented practice for
signs of safety with that suite of tools that we talked
about.
Q Okay. And so you think that's all positive
developments and good for the protection of children?
16
A
Absolutely.
17
18
19
20
Q One final point, then. I'm switching gears now
and I'm going to take you to the evidence that Mr. Olson
took you to from Dr. Trocmé, and he showed us that chart
with Manitoba having a very high incidence of children in
21
care.
Would you agree with me that this issue of Winnipeg
22
23
24
25
having a high number of children in care, perhaps the
highest in Canada, has been with us for many decades?
A Yes. It's actually Manitoba, I think, rather
than Winnipeg, but you're right, it's been --
- 106 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
Q
A
decades.
Sorry, I meant to say -- right.
-- with us -- it's been with us for many
4
5
6
7
8
9
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12
Q One final question. I'm just going to have to
find a document.
THE COMMISSIONER: Do you have an explanation for
that, Doctor?
THE WITNESS: It's probably an incomplete
explanation, but one factor is the high proportion of
aboriginal children in Manitoba's population and the issues
related to deprivation that exist in those communities
that, you know, has contributed to that, to that rate of
13
children in care.
It's also related to potentially other
14
15
16
17
kinds of sort of related factors, like poverty, housing
and, and, and sort of addictions and related family issues
that flow from these issues, and it's not only aboriginal
children and families; it obviously affects some non-
18
aboriginal families as well.
And perhaps what I've
19
20
21
22
referred to earlier, a lack of adequate support measures
and initiatives that can help combat that by trying to
provide more family support and community caring types of
services in those communities.
23
24
25
BY MR. MCKINNON:
Q Okay. Now, the one final theme I wanted to
- 107 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
explore with you is, is not an issue that Mr. Olson raised
but one that I anticipate others may raise who give
evidence after you, and, and so I'm going to ask you to
4
comment on this:
If someone were to suggest to this
5
6
7
8
9
10
Commission that the funding for differential response or
the funding for family enhancement be diverted to
community-based organizations, essentially eliminated from
the family service stream and moved over to a communitybased
service organizations, would you think that would be
a good idea or a bad idea?
11
A
I would say that that would not be a good idea
12
and I would say it would be a very, very -- underline those
13
14
words -- serious mistake.
follows:
And the reasons for that are as
15
16
17
First of all, since 2006 we've been concentrating
in this province on building capacity within the Child and
Family Service system to provide an alternate approach to
18
providing services.
That's been six to seven years in
19
duration in terms of building that capacity.
That
20
21
22
23
initiatives -- those initiatives would be lost of that
transfer would occur.
Secondly, the -- we do not have a well-developed
child welfare NGO sector in this province as some other
24
jurisdictions do where that model exists.
And what I mean
25
by that are quasi child welfare agencies with training and
- 108 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
expertise in the delivery of child welfare service and a
history of providing those services in combination with the
government sector.
Thirdly, the availability of those types of
services outside the City of Winnipeg, even if you said
some of those existed here, are largely absent, so it's
ability to provide an answer to many of the -- to the
aboriginal authorities who serve many smaller and remote
9
10
communities would be no-existent under that model.
doesn't work in that particular context.
It
11
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25
And finally, you do introduce new factors that
have to be considered if that was to be contemplated, and
that is issues related to coordination and interface with
family enhancement services and the child protection
mandate that we've just been speaking about that, that need
to be a part of the child welfare system.
Now, none of the reasons that I've mentioned
should be taken to suggest that non-government
organizations at the community don't have a larger role to
play in building a differential response system, they do,
but the way to deal with that is to strengthen capacity
both within the Child and Family Service agencies and in
community non-government organizations and to coordinate
the nature of those services and how they are provided to
provide better services to children and families.
- 109 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (MCKINNON) MAY 31, 2013
1
Q
And when you talk about coordination of services,
2
3
4
the analogy I use, it's, it was a sports analogy, but
Winnipeg CFS, people working in the family enhancement
stream, are often called case managers --
5
6
7
8
A
Q
A
Q
Right.
-- you know that term?
Yes.
And the analogy I use is that that's like the
9
quarterback.
They call the huddle, they make the plays,
10
11
12
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14
15
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17
18
19
20
they often hand off the ball, and they can hand it off to
community-based agencies but there's got to be someone in
charge, and that's the fundamental difference, I would
suggest, between a family enhancement model that's in a
child welfare agency and a family -- and services being
delivered outside the agency. Is that fair?
A It is fair. Those, those social workers in that
capacity have two roles. One is the case management or the
quarterback role in that, in the way, in, in your use of
the, the analogy; but secondly, they do, because of other
lower caseloads and so on, do provide direct, important
21
22
direct services that are a part of that package.
not only case management but it is case work.
So it's
23
MR. MCKINNON:
Okay. And that's, that's helpful.
24
25
That's -- I appreciate your clarification on that point.
Those are my questions, Mr. Commissioner.
- 110 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - CR-EX. (HARRIS) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you. Thank you, Mr.
McKinnon. Anyone else? Ms. Harris?
3
4
5
MS. HARRIS:
One very brief question.
Good afternoon, Mr. Commissioner.
6
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MS. HARRIS:
7
Q
Dr. McKenzie, I'm Laurelle Harris, I'm counsel
8
for the general authority.
And the only question I have
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10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
for you this afternoon is if you could please expand on the
impact that funding has in the proper functioning of child
protection systems, whether it's the investigative
protection end or the family enhancement end, and
specifically, would you agree with the notion that whatever
the funding looks like, that the funding should be truly
case sensitive and reflective of actual caseloads and also
deal with the fact that there are things which are being
funded out of the current model that don't have line items,
18
19
such as support workers, et cetera.
that?
Would you agree with
20
21
22
A
I would agree with that.
MS. HARRIS: That's my only question.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right. Anyone else? Ms.
23
Dunn.
24
MS. DUNN: I might just speak to Ms. (inaudible).
25
- 111 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - RE-EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
RE-EXAMINATION BY MR. OLSON:
2
Q
The question, the question is who would you see
3
4
5
6
-- that is, who would see, in terms of CFS needing a bigger
role, community service provider, in needing a bigger role
to provide services for the agency in terms of to the
community.
7
8
9
10
A
Q
A
Q
Right.
Do you understand the question?
No.
I probably phrased it terribly, but you talked
11
about the community could provide a bigger role.
12
13
14
15
A
Q
A
Q
Okay.
In, in providing support services.
Right.
Who do you see as, as providing that role, which,
16
which community services?
17
A
Well, I think that it depends a little bit about
18
19
20
21
the organizations that exist within communities because
those do vary significantly, depending on the community,
but it includes formal government-related services like
health, education and, and I suppose even income support,
22
but certainly those services.
But it included, includes
23
24
non-government services that, that provide sort of
potential family and parenting support services to, to
25
families that need those services.
And what's important
- 112 -

B.D. MCKENZIE - RE-EX. (OLSON) MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
about that is that we have to find a better mechanism to
coordinate those services, and that needs to be thought
about carefully because I don't think that kind of
coordination is fully in place in our current system.
Q Okay. I was going to ask about the case, the
6
7
case manager Mr. McKinnon talked about.
social worker, I think --
That person, a
8
9
10
11
12
A
Q
A
Q
A
That's right.
-- is acting as sort of a quarterback?
That's right.
Coordinating those services for the family?
That, that quarterback coordinates some of the
13
14
15
16
17
services for family enhancement that the child welfare
system, you know, are involved in. But I also spoke about,
earlier, spoke earlier about services that might involve
support services to families that might not even reach the
child welfare system, and it's important that those
18
19
services be coordinated, as well.
to find ways of doing that better.
And, you know, we have
20
21
Q Okay. So sort of another sort of quarterback
function before you even get to the child welfare --
22
23
24
25
A
Q
earlier?
A
That's right.
-- area on the pyramid we were talking about
Yeah.
- 113 -

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
6
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you, Mr. Olson. Do you
have any questions?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: No.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right. Well, that
completes the witness, then, does it, Mr. Olson?
MR. OLSON: It does.
7
8
9
THE COMMISSIONER:
McKenzie, very helpful to us.
THE WITNESS: Okay.
Thank you very much, Dr.
10
THE COMMISSIONER: Appreciate you being here.
11
12
(WITNESS EXCUSED)
13
14
MS. WALSH:
Mr. Commissioner, as you can see we
15
16
17
18
19
have a panel for our next --
THE COMMISSIONER: Yes.
MS. WALSH: -- group of witnesses.
THE COMMISSIONER: Welcome.
MS. KNOL: Thank you.
20
21
MS. WALSH:
them sworn or affirmed.
So we can begin by having each of
22
THE CLERK: I'll start at the end. If you could
23
stand for a moment.
And is it your choice to swear on the
24
25
Bible or affirm without the Bible?
MS. CYR: On the Bible is fine.
- 114 -

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
1
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3
4
5
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THE CLERK: Bible? Okay. Okay, if you could
just start by telling me your full name.
MS. CYR: Bernice Anne Cyr.
THE CLERK: And spell me your first name.
MS. CYR: B-E-R-N-I-C-E.
THE CLERK: And your middle name?
MS. CYR: A-N-N-E.
THE CLERK: And your last name, please.
MS. CYR: C-Y-R.
THE CLERK: Thank you.
11
12
13
name, sorry?
THE COMMISSIONER:
MS. CYR: C-Y-R.
How do you spell your last
14
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you.
15
16
17
BERNICE ANNE CYR, sworn, testified
as follows:
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
THE CLERK: Thank you. You may be seated.
Could I ask you to stand.
THE COMMISSIONER: Just be careful you don't fall
off the back there now.
MS. WALSH: Please.
THE CLERK: Is it your choice to swear or affirm?
MS. ROUSSIN: Affirm.
- 115 -

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
THE CLERK: All right. And just state your full
name to the court, please.
MS. ROUSSIN: It's Diane Louise Roussin.
4
THE CLERK:
Diane and Louise are in the usual
5
6
7
8
9
10
spelling, and how many N's?
MS. ROUSSIN: One N.
THE CLERK: One N. Okay. And your last name,
please?
MS. ROUSSIN: R-O-U-S-S-I-N.
THE CLERK: Thank you.
11
12
13
DIANE LOUISE ROUSSIN, affirmed,
testified as follows:
14
15
16
17
THE CLERK: Thank you.
Tell me your full name, please.
MS. TAYLOR: Sharon Elaine Taylor.
18
19
THE CLERK:
the usual spelling?
Sharon and Elaine and Taylor all in
20
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
21
THE CLERK:
And is it your choice to swear or
22
affirm?
23
24
MS. TAYLOR: Affirm.
THE CLERK: All right.
25
- 116 -

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
1
2
SHARON ELAINE TAYLOR, affirmed,
testified as follows:
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
THE CLERK: Thank you. You may be seated.
Tell me your full name, please.
MS. KNOL: Dilly Marie Knol.
THE CLERK: And L-I-L-Y (sic)?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
THE CLERK: Usual spelling for Marie?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
THE CLERK: And Knol?
MS. KNOL: K-N-O-L.
13
THE CLERK:
And would you like to swear or
14
affirm?
15
MS. KNOL: Affirm.
16
17
18
DILLY MARIE KNOL, affirmed,
testified as follows:
19
20
THE CLERK: Thank you. You may be seated.
21
MS. WALSH:
Now, can each of you make sure that
22
23
24
25
your microphone is on? Okay.
MS. KNOL: Okay. Probably not. Hello? Hello?
MS. WALSH: Doesn't sound like it.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: No.
- 117 -

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
MS. WALSH: Diane, can you maybe put your mind --
THE CLERK: I don't know (inaudible).
THE COMMISSIONER: Are any of them on?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Hello, hello.
MS. TAYLOR: This one is.
6
MS. WALSH:
Just one seems to be activated, so
7
8
9
10
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13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
that's not going to be very good.
MS. KNOL: We're used to sharing.
MS. WALSH: Budget cuts. We're using one
microphone for four. No, that's not going to work.
THE CLERK: I don't know anything about them. I
wasn't here when they were set up. I don't know --
THE COMMISSIONER: Who, who set it up?
MS. WALSH: Who sets these things up? Our tech
person.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Usually they lead to
buttons where you would cue one, two, three, four
(inaudible).
MS. TAYLOR: I'll take that one, that ...
THE CLERK: (Inaudible) connected to this
microphone.
22
MS. WALSH:
Well, let, let me try this, because,
23
24
25
of course, we did have a discussion about there being a
concern that you shouldn't all talk at once, so perhaps,
then, since you are good at sharing and you're very
- 118 -

PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
accommodating and I don't want to take up any unnecessary
time, can we just pass the microphone? Is it --
MS. ROUSSIN: Sure.
MS. WALSH: -- physically able to do?
MS. KNOL: Can you reach it down there?
MS. WALSH: Does it work?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Does it reach?
MS. WALSH: Do we have a long enough. Okay.
Let's maybe move the glasses. Can we just do that, please,
and the water, so ...
MS. ROUSSIN: Yeah. I think that will work.
12
13
to help us?
THE COMMISSIONER:
Does the sheriff, is he able
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
A SHERIFF OFFICER: See if the mics work now.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Hello.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Hello.
MS. WALSH: Oh, well done.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Hello. Oh.
THE COMMISSIONER: Oh, hello.
MS. WALSH: Well, done, thank you.
THE CLERK: Someone at the back did that.
22
23
the back. I see.
THE COMMISSIONER:
Oh, there's the gentleman at
24
25
MS. WALSH: Thank you. Now, having said that, I
would still ask that you avoid speaking all at once, now
- 119 -

B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
that you have the power.
What I'm going to do, Mr. Commissioner, is I will
start by introducing each one of our panel members.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right. Let me thank the
technician for getting that going for us.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: thank you.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
8
9
DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MS. WALSH:
10
MS. WALSH:
So I'll start by introducing each of
11
you.
Then we'll go back and ask each of you what your
12
13
14
15
16
respective organization does and then I will put out some
questions for you to answer individually, whoever wants to
-- you know, by whoever wants to take the lead. But, we'll
start with the introductions.
Dilly?
17
MS. KNOL:
My name is Dilly Knol and I'm the
18
19
executive director of Andrews Street Family Centre.
MS. WALSH: Okay.
20
MS. TAYLOR:
Hello, I'm Sharon Taylor, the
21
22
23
executive director of Wolseley Family Place.
MS. ROUSSIN: Hi, and I am Diane Roussin, I'm the
executive director with the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre.
24
MS. CYR:
And I'm Bernice Cyr, the executive
25
director of Native Women's Transition Centre.
- 120 -

B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
MS. WALSH: Okay. Let's start, then, with
Andrews Street Centre. What is that?
3
MS. KNOL:
Andrews Street Family Centre is a
4
5
family resource centre located in the north end of Winnipeg
in the William Whyte area.
6
We have programs for all ages.
We have a, an
7
8
9
10
aboriginal preschool program for 40 children in total, and
also work with the parents of those children. We also have
a Pritchard Place program, which is program for after
school and weekend and seven-day-a-week program for kids
11
six to seventeen-year-old.
It's a drop-in program that is
12
13
14
15
mostly unstructured but we do have some structured
programming there.
We have a parenting helping parents program,
which supports parents in the community with home visits.
16
They help them at appointments.
They basically support
17
18
19
20
21
parents wherever parents need support. It could be helping
them find some shoes, housing, those kind of things,
whatever they need to do. They also run parenting programs
all throughout the year, the year.
We also have a volunteer program so we have
22
volunteers locally from the community.
We have over a
23
24
25
hundred volunteers, actually, and they volunteer in all
areas of the centre. And this is all in one building. And
they volunteer, helping with different programs and
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2
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wherever they can help.
We, we also have an addictions support worker
now, and I have to say thanks to an anonymous donor.
4
We also have the food security program.
We do
5
three different ways of food.
We have a food buying club,
6
7
we have community soup and food for families on Thursdays
and we also now have family fun night where we feed people
8
9
on Thursday -- Wednesday evenings.
switched around, that's all.
Sorry, that just got
10
And, and then we have the drop-in itself.
It's
11
12
13
14
for anyone in the neighbourhood can drop in and we have --
they can do laundry up to a couple loads of laundry at a
time, there's always bread for at least toast, or whatever,
they can very day, because we have people from homeless
15
people to families that come into the program.
And we
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18
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support them whatever way they want. There's always coffee
on, and it's a place where they can socialize and feel safe
in the community because the -- all our programs are
really, it's a place of safety for our families and our
community and a place to start capacity building for our
families and help them, support them in any way we can. We
do whatever we can wherever we can.
And we also, I think is important, is we hire
from the community also, so it's not so much professional
people as people that got training, parents themselves who
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got training on how to do parenting program. Those kind of
2
things.
So not only -- I think they have more skills
3
4
5
6
7
because their own life skills to follow through, which
really relates to the families that we work with, so ...
I'm trying to make sure I didn't miss anything.
I probably missed some stuff, but the drop-in itself also
has an evening of activities and stuff for people, in the
8
drop-in, they come in just to socialize.
It's a way of
9
10
giving them -- if we want them to not be doing something
that's negative, then we have to give them something
11
positive to go to and to be able to attend what of.
And
12
these things don't cost them money, so it's free.
And we
13
14
15
always have a children's program area also so if people are
in parenting we have a place where their kids can be
watched while families are coming for resources, so it's
16
not an hindrance for them to get there.
And we'll also
17
18
give bus tickets for them for coming for programming and
stuff whenever we can afford to.
19
MS. WALSH:
So who comes and makes use of your
20
centre?
21
MS. KNOL:
Everybody in -- everybody in the
22
23
neighbourhood.
for 17 years.
In fact, I'd have to say, we've been open
In the last going on five years now we also
24
25
get as many men coming to our resources as women because
they're seeing it as a place that they can come in and they
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1
2
3
feel welcome, and they need help, too, sometimes and just
someone to talk to is what they need sometimes to get them
going.
4
5
6
MS. WALSH:
seeing are out there?
MS. KNOL:
And what kinds of needs are you
Anywhere -- we're not dealing with
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
crisis but it's like we deal with crisis all the time. But
the needs come from not having a place to live, to having
fear that their children might be apprehended, or maybe
their child has been apprehended and they're coming to see
if we can help them with, you know, resources that they now
need to get parenting programs and those kinds of supports
for them to be able to be better parents and be able to get
their children back kind of thing, so ...
15
MS. WALSH:
If there's a need that your centre
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
can't meet, what do you do?
MS. KNOL: We, we have a network of agencies that
we work with in our community and we work very well with.
And so we kind of, whatever we don't service we know
another resource in the area that we trust that will treat
our parents, our families well, then we will refer them to
them. But a lot of the people like local stuff. They,
23
they feel -- they build a relationship.
The families need
24
25
to build a relationship with people in order to really tell
you what their life's about and to get the truth of what's
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1
happening so that you can really work at fixing things and
2
helping them along their journey.
Not fix it for them but
3
give them the power and tools to fix it for themselves.
4
5
MS. WALSH:
successful in doing that?
And do you feel the centre is
6
MS. KNOL: I do.
7
8
9
10
MS. WALSH:
centre, did you say?
MS. KNOL:
there --
How long have you been with the
I was a founding member, so I've been
11
MS. WALSH: Seventeen years.
12
13
(inaudible).
MS. KNOL:
I'm going to retire there soon
14
MS. WALSH: How are you funded?
15
MS. KNOL:
We have funding from everywhere and
16
anywhere.
I get a federal funding, provincial funding,
17
18
19
city funding, United Way, Winnipeg Foundation, anonymous
donor and anywhere else I can get, you know, funding for
specific things like the roof and, you know, kind of thing
20
so whenever you need, something happens.
And we also are
21
22
lucky, we've, we also have some corporation have built
relationships so they sponsor some of my Christmas programs
23
and stuff for families and that.
So it's all about
24
keeping, keeping yourself open and alive.
And really, we
25
don't advertise about Andrews Street and I don't advertise
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about our programs because it's word of mouth and it's not
2
like we're not full.
We have people coming in daily and
3
new people coming in all the time, and it's word of mouth
4
from other
people who feel that they, they've been
5
6
7
respected and that they've gotten what they need from the
centre so they refer other people and other families to the
centre.
8
MS. WALSH:
Do any of the people who use your
9
10
11
centre have contact with the child welfare system?
MS. KNOL: Yes. Many of them, especially the
ones that work with my Parents Helping Parents program.
12
MS. WALSH:
And the centre itself, does it have
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
any formal working relationship with any aspect of the
child welfare system?
MS. KNOL: Not really. We, we certainly have a
few of the workers that we connect better with, let's say,
that are willing to connect with -- see, we're not
professionals, so a lot of times CF --
MS. WALSH: Well, you're, you're showing what the
record won't show, is that you've done air quotation marks.
MS. KNOL: Oops, sorry.
MS. TAYLOR: Air quotes.
MS. WALSH: No, that's fine. But what do you
mean when you say you're not professionals?
25
MS. KNOL:
Like they don't have degrees and all
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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these things.
It's their life skills and they've gotten
2
training on how to do the parenting programs, right, and we
3
train wherever we can get training and stuff.
But they
4
5
6
don't have degrees and stuff so they're not professional --
they're not social workers. So some -- I feel lot of times
a CFS worker feel that, you know, they're not, they don't
7
have the wisdom or they -- what do they have to offer.
So
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
they would prefer to seclude us. Like sometimes we wonder,
well, why didn't they phone us, this family's been coming
here for like four years working with us and you won't even
bother coming and talk to us about what's happening so we
can support them, continue to support them, you know, those
kind of things.
So, and we have had a few workers that we can
connect with and that get it and see the benefits of
working with us for the families, because that's our bottom
17
line, is for the kids and parents.
So some of them work
18
with us and will give us that information, and we can talk
19
back and forth kind of thing.
But the, I'd say the
20
21
majority of them tend to feel like we're not important
enough.
22
MS. WALSH:
What's the impact of that on the
23
24
25
people who use your centre?
MS. KNOL: It's very frustrating like because we,
we don't -- just because they don't want to have anything
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
to do with us, we continue to go to meetings and, you know,
and sometimes they'll say my workers can't come in the
room, and as long as the parent wants them in the room, I
4
say no one can stop you from going in that room.
So you
5
6
7
learn that you have rights and they can't scare you off
kind of thing and say something that's not true, because if
the parent wants someone there, they can have someone
8
there.
My workers don't do the talking; we're just there
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
to support them because these parents are saying that the
workers say one thing to them, they come out and they try
to get -- let's say we need parenting programs, so they
come and set that all up and then they do the parenting and
go back, and then the worker will say, oh, well now you
need to do this and you need to do that, or, I didn't tell
you that's all there was. So if there's someone else there
that can witness what's being said, because there seems to
be, it's always miscommunication.
18
MS. WALSH:
And just one more question before I
19
20
21
22
move on to, to Sharon, is it your sense that the people who
use your centre trust people who work at your centre?
MS. KNOL: Absolutely.
THE COMMISSIONER: What's the question?
23
MS. WALSH:
Whether her experience was that the
24
25
people who use her centre trust the people who work at the
centre.
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THE COMMISSIONER: Oh, at the -- okay.
2
MS. WALSH:
Sharon, tell us about your centre,
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
what it provides, who uses it, what kind of staff you have
and the interaction between the users and your centre with
Child and Family Services.
THE CLERK: (Inaudible).
MS. TAYLOR: Pull it away? Okay. That's good?
Well, we're a family resource centre located in
the West Broadway area, which is in the Langside, Furby,
Sherbrook area, catchment area that we work in.
As a family resource centre, we have a preschool,
we have -- and in that preschool we'll have respite where
parents can be off site, a limited number of parents can be
off site, but they can also, the majority of our parents
15
are on site.
We offer parenting classes, which we offer
16
one-in-one parenting.
We offer Triple "P", we offer
17
Nobody's Perfect, we offer attachment parenting classes, we
18
operate parenting classes all year round.
We do prenatal
19
and postnatal classes.
We have health services which
20
21
22
23
24
25
involves having a doctor come once a week, and we have a
health educator that will do various workshops on current
issues that the families might be talking about, about
immunization, various things, diabetes, whatever the
families sort of express to us that they would need.
We also cover and assist parents with their basic
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1
needs being met because, the majority of them, their basic
2
needs are not being met.
So you offer a free phone,
3
because even to this day social assistance still sees it as
4
a luxury.
And then we have laundry on site and we offer
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
emergency food and a food bank.
We also deal with issues around substance abuse
and violence, and that's where we work with the whole
family unit as far as them defining what the goal is to be
able to work on the issues around, that they define as the
issues around addictions and violence.
We're also a drop-in and people can just come and
have a safe place to be and be able to network with many of
13
the other people that come.
We have computers on site
14
15
16
17
18
because many of our families do not have access to
computers.
And then we have a position where we deal with
providing assistance around EIA, around housing, food
security, all of those type of issues.
19
20
21
MS. WALSH:
like advocacy or ...
MS. TAYLOR:
When you say "assistance", you mean
Social assistance, if they need
22
23
24
25
assistance around lawyer, legal issues, we provide those
type of things, or be able to refer to resources that they
would be able to receive those assistance.
We're dealing with approximately 3500 individual
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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families per year that come about 30,000 times.
The
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
population that we're working with is a large percentage
are aboriginal and we're seeing a lot more refugees, a
large percentage, so we're up at about 25 percent are
refugees.
The commonality that I would say that all these
families are experiencing, in my opinion, are very -- about
the effects of poverty and how the poverties affects
9
families.
And I think the biggest barrier that I've
10
11
experienced in my life working in this job, because I'm,
like Dilly, one of the co-founders, is the systemic
12
barriers.
Like, nobody is really talking about the
13
14
15
systemic barriers are the biggest barriers that our
families are experiencing.
MS. WALSH: And what are those?
16
MS. TAYLOR:
Systemic barriers is poverty, one,
17
18
19
discrimination, marginalized, what's it like to be
isolated, transportation, child care. You could go through
the whole gambit. And I've been in social services for 35
20
years and those issues haven't gone away.
In fact, it's
21
22
23
24
25
getting bigger and that gap is getting bigger between the
haves and the have-nots.
When you ask about funding, I have multiple
funders. I think at this point I have 14. I have federal
funding, I have provincial funding, I have child care
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1
2
funding, I have three foundations and then I have
individual funders and I have private, anonymous donors.
3
And it still isn't enough.
Like, you're just always
4
5
6
7
8
9
cutting it and nobody really wants to pay for the
infrastructure.
So I don't know if I'm answering -- so we try to
do holistic services and we try to provide services
according to what the families tell us what they need.
When I first started, it felt like a good feel
10
place that you would just do a parenting class.
As time
11
12
went on, you realized that people's lives are very complex
and then how do we be able to assist and work with them in
13
many ways.
And so we just keep expanding in areas, with a
14
15
limited budget, to be able to provide whatever the families
need.
16
MS. WALSH:
And in terms of interacting with
17
18
19
20
21
22
child welfare services, do your clients have interaction
with the child welfare system?
MS. TAYLOR: Yes, they do.
MS. WALSH: And does your agency have any kind of
formal interaction with the system, child welfare?
MS. TAYLOR: I don't know if it's formal but they
23
will refer people to us.
And sometimes it's very limited
24
25
because we have to consider what the people that we're
serving want because they don't always trust Child and
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
Family Services because it seems that it's very much about
apprehension versus about having, providing supports to
3
family.
So it becomes a very awkward position, but we do
4
have a relationship with them where they will refer people
5
to us.
We will tell them about what services are
6
7
available, so it's reciprocal in a way, and it's sometimes
very dependent upon individual workers.
8
MS. WALSH:
Do you find that the people who come
9
10
to use your services trust your staff?
MS. TAYLOR: Yes, explicitly. I think because,
11
one, we, we don't define ourselves as experts.
We work
12
with them where they're at, and it's sort of the harm
13
reduction model:
it's about working with them where
14
they're at and going along with them in the journey as to
15
what they sort of feel their needs are.
In our program
16
17
18
19
20
21
around addictions and substance abuse, we have, we had an
evaluation that said we were actually doing better than one
of the largest organizations that deals with addiction and
violence.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
Diane.
22
MS. ROUSSIN:
So I, I'm the executive Ma Mawi Wi
23
24
25
Chi Itata Centre and Ma Mawi is many, many things, but I
guess number one, we're an indigenous-led organization so
we have an all indigenous board of directors and we have
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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primarily an indigenous staff and we're somewhere in the
2
3
neighborhood of a hundred and seventy-five.
summertime we have more summer students.
Fluctuates;
4
5
THE COMMISSIONER: Hundred and twenty-five staff?
MS. ROUSSIN: A hundred and seventy-five.
6
7
staff members?
THE COMMISSIONER:
A hundred and seventy-five
8
MS. ROUSSIN: Yes. That doesn't include our
9
volunteer base.
We have a very large volunteer base as
10
11
well. And again, that would be full-time. We have a whole
bunch of casual and we have a whole bunch of foster
12
parents.
I would say that we're the largest urban
13
14
aboriginal organization in Winnipeg. We've been around for
29 years. We deliver over 50 different programs and
15
16
services and resources.
sites throughout the city.
We operate out of 11 different
We do have one healing lodge
17
out, out of town.
We deliver youth leadership mentorship
18
programs, we have three resource centres very similar to
19
Wolseley and to Andrews Street.
We have family violence
20
21
programming, we recruit and train aboriginal foster
families to provide foster care for kids who are in care of
22
CFS, both long term and short term foster families.
We
23
24
25
have five group homes and each group home has a different
specialty and focus.
THE COMMISSIONER: Speak right into the mic, will
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
4
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you, please.
MS. ROUSSIN: Oh, sorry. You can't hear me. I
was pushing it away, I thought I would be too close.
MS. TAYLOR: You didn't want to sound like me.
MS. ROUSSIN: Yeah. So we, we deliver quite a
6
variety of services.
You know, we've really grown since
7
8
9
our inception and, and that's been very focused and
specific, just knowing that aboriginal people need to be in
a position to deliver services to our aboriginal families
10
and that we can do that and we need to do that.
And, you
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
know, there's a certain level of capacity within our
aboriginal community to do that, always recognizing that
there can always be more and there can always be
improvement.
I think the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre, Ma Mawi
Wi Chi Itata is a, is a phrase, it's Ojibway, and it
translates into we all work together to help one another,
and that phrase is really grounded in this concept of
19
reciprocity.
So when the organization was found, it
20
21
22
23
recognized that, okay, so we will be some -- we'll, we'll
get some dollars, we'll hire some staff and we'll be these
helpers in the community. But there is such a large job to
do out there that we need to really rely on the community
24
to get that job done.
So it's a reciprocal kind of
25
relationship in that, you know, there's some things we can
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1
2
do but there's a lot more that the community can do.
so that's really what grounds our service philosophy.
And
And
3
4
so all of our services have to have opportunity -- you
know, people need help, the services are there for them to
5
access some of that help.
But every one of our services
6
7
8
9
10
11
also needs to have the other side of it where, if people
want to give and if people want to participate in a
different way, not from the deficits model but from a
strengths model, that we provide that opportunity as well.
So we're challenged every day to find opportunities within
all of our services where people can give back and
12
contribute.
And so we'll often -- that's why we have such
13
14
15
16
17
a large volunteer base, and so -- because people want to
participate and give more than they want to receive the
emergency services type style.
So, so we try to create places and spaces where
people are comfortable, where they feel like they belong,
18
where they feel like they actually own the place.
If you
19
20
21
22
23
24
walk into any one of our centres you'll -- we have very few
staff in those centres; it's pretty much run by the
community and that's because the community just takes
ownership because they feel like they belong there, they
feel like the service and the place is theirs, and it is.
So, you know, we have similar to what the two
25
ladies previous have talked about.
We have, you know, the
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coffee's always on, there's always at least toast, you
2
know, if nothing else.
The washing machine's there, the
3
telephone's there, the internet access is there.
More
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
importantly, there's people there that you can connect with
because, again, at the core of all of our programs and
services we're in the business of building relationships
and, you know, in order to have a really good service under
any banner you really have to have good trusting
relationships with your families in order for the service
to work, and so that's really important to us and we try
really hard to, to do that and build that foundation.
MS. WALSH: How successful --
THE COMMISSIONER: What hours are you open?
14
MS. ROUSSIN:
Depend -- different services are
15
open at different times.
For instance, our 363 site,
16
because that's a partnership model, we're open 365 days a
17
year, pretty much from 8:00 a.m. till 9:00 p.m.
Other
18
19
services will be 9:00 to 5:00 Monday to Friday. Obviously,
our group homes are 24 hours a day, you know, 365 days a
20
year.
Same with foster families; obviously, they would be
21
22
23
24
25
on all the time. So it's really all over the map --
THE COMMISSIONER: Yeah.
MS. ROUSSIN: -- because our services are so --
there's such a variety of service that the hours are, are
all over the place.
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
We also -- so, you know, that's the core of
2
working with our families.
Ma Mawi is often really looked
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
to, to participate in cross sector initiatives, in a lot of
collaborative sorts of things in Winnipeg, so we sit at a
lot of coalition tables, we sit at a lot of collaboration
tables. You know, the aboriginal (inaudible) for the North
End, you know, Ma Mawi is the administrative lead on that.
The, a vision for Merchant's corner where we've, you know,
a group of us as a coalition have acquired the Merchant's
Hotel and we're going to turn that into a community hub
and, you know, with lots of housing and supports for
12
community.
Ma Mawi is the administrative lead on the
13
community led or organizations united together coalition,
14
short form is CLOUT, CLOUT coalition.
So Ma Mawi is often
15
16
17
18
19
asked to be the lead administrator for a number of those
kind of collaborative initiatives.
We administrate an aboriginal Head Start program
with -- can't think, it's escaped me but --
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Little Red --
20
MS. ROUSSIN:
Little Red, Little Red Spirit.
21
22
23
24
25
We're -- Ma Mawi is the administrator on, on a particular
part of the Live Safe initiative, which again is another
tri-level sort of initiative with -- here in the city.
We're participating, again, through
administrating a coordinator through the parent/child
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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2
3
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7
8
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centres in community schools. So there's all these sort of
one-offs that we're always asked to participate in because
I think as an organization we have built our capacity to,
to lead and to collaborate and to administrate and to, you
know, we have a pretty sophisticated financial department,
you know, to do the financial reporting.
But more importantly, I think Ma Mawi is seen as
a real lead around bring that indigenous perspective and
that indigenous voice to the table, so we often get asked
to participate on, you know, committees or consultations,
or whatever, to bring that voice forward so ...
MS. WALSH: Where does your funding come from?
MS. ROUSSIN: We get it from everywhere. We are
14
excellent grant seekers.
The majority of our funding, you
15
16
17
know, and depending on how much of the other funding we
get, I would say it fluctuates anywhere from 65 to 85
percent comes from the province, and again, a variety of
18
departments within the province.
We get funding from the
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
City of Winnipeg, we get funding from the federal
government, we get from United Way, Winnipeg Foundation,
True North Foundation, various small grants we're always
applying for. You know, we have our corporate donors that,
you know, donate to us and then we have private donors as
well. So it's really from under every rock. We, we spend
a lot of time turning over the rocks.
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
MS. WALSH:
Tell us about the interaction with
2
3
Child and Family Services both of, on the part of the
agency itself and the people who use your services?
4
MS. ROUSSIN:
Well, it would be in a number of
5
6
7
ways, so we recruit and train aboriginal foster parents and
so our long term foster family program is the Ozosunon
program, so we're somewhere in the neighbourhood of like a
8
hundred twenty beds there.
But, yeah, so we will sort of
9
recruit and train and support aboriginal families to be
10
foster parents for kids who are in the care of CFS.
We
11
12
have a shorter term foster family program called the CLOUT
program, Community-Led Organizations United Together
13
program.
And so that's the younger children and it's a
14
short-term emergency-based foster placement program.
And
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
again, recruit and train aboriginal foster families to, to
be those placements for kids.
Again, five group homes. And so all of our group
homes would be kids who are in the care of CFS. Typically,
mostly teenage, the teenagers, 18 and under. Our boys home
is, I think, 12, 12 years and up.
So we have our -- we have three community care
sites, resource centres and so families will walk in and
either they're already involved with CFS and so how can
they -- they'll sometimes need some advocacy to keep their
25
kids.
Sometimes they will need to do things to get their
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
kids back, and sometimes they're just struggling, you know,
and so they can come to us and we can figure out what it is
that's creating the stress, you know, before we get to that
4
protection stage, right.
So sometimes people just need
5
6
help with how are they going to drag five kids around to do
laundry, you know, or sometimes they just need
7
transportation.
Sometimes they need someone just look
8
9
10
after their kids so they can go grocery shopping.
you know, sometimes parents just need a break.
mean, there's all kinds of things that come up.
I mean,
Like, I
11
12
MS. WALSH: And does your agency have capacity to
meet those kinds of needs?
13
MS. ROUSSIN:
We try to as much as possible
14
15
16
17
within our budgets. So again, you know, we try to --
whatever the family is coming in the door with, we try to
respond to that as best as we can with the resources we
have. We work, obviously, with our sister organizations as
18
19
much as possible and we'll refer if we can.
not to turn anybody away as much as possible.
So we, we try
If we don't
20
21
22
have it, then we try to figure out who's got it and how can
we get it.
MS. WALSH: Okay. And I'll come back to how you
23
four, and then with others, collaborate.
One more
24
25
question: Are you a mandated child welfare agency?
MS. ROUSSIN: We're a community-mandated ...
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Well, so when Ma Mawi was formed there was a vigorous
debate at that time about what -- because there was not a
lot of indigenous-led services and Ma Mawi was formed in
response to the child welfare system because back then an
aboriginal child died in the care of CFS and so the
aboriginal community started, you know, getting together to
figure out, well, surely we can do something about this.
And so vigorous debate about whether or not the Ma Mawi Wi
9
Chi
Itata Centre would pursue the legal mandate to
10
11
12
apprehend children, and back then it was decided no.
and --
MS. WALSH: Why is that?
And,
13
MS. ROUSSIN:
-- the reason for that is because
14
there's reciprocity in that, you know, fundamental
15
philosophy that the organization would be.
In order to
16
17
build very trusting relationships with families you can't
have the power to take away their kids, and that was the
18
thinking back then and that's the thinking today.
So I
19
20
21
22
have the luxury of being able to talk to those people who
are around who formed Ma Mawi way back when. They're still
walking around, I can still talk to them, and then there's
still people who work at the agency who were around in
23
those days.
And so that conversation does come up every
24
25
now and then and we're still firm, you know, we don't want
the legal -- we don't want the power to take away kids, we
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
want to work with the families in supportive preventative
way.
3
MS. WALSH:
Just before we get to Bernice, when,
4
5
6
when Diane said why Ma Mawi had declined the opportunity or
declined becoming a mandated agency because in order -- I
can't recall your exact words but --
7
MS. ROUSSIN:
In order to build the really true,
8
9
trusting relationships with families you can't have the
power to take away their kids.
10
MS. WALSH:
So I saw all of you nod your heads.
11
12
13
Was I accurate in perceiving that?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
14
MS. WALSH:
Is that a statement you all agree
15
with?
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
MS. WALSH: Okay. Thank you. Anything else
before I go on to Bernice?
MS. ROUSSIN: No, don't think so.
MS. WALSH: Okay.
MS. ROUSSIN: (Inaudible) thank you.
MS. CYR: My name is Bernice Cyr. I'm the
executive director of Native Women's Transition Centre.
Native Women's Transition Centre has been around for 34
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
years.
It's the only aboriginal-led aboriginal women's
2
long-term transitional facility in the province.
We have
3
4
5
60 beds, three sites. And we work with women who are
escaping violence, men's violence, economic violence,
system violence and addiction issues and are looking for
6
long-term supports and including residential.
So we work
7
towards creating a safe environment for women and children.
8
We have many funders.
Well, we have some big
9
10
funders and then the rest we actually had to seek out per
diems.
11
THE COMMISSIONER:
Who's the big funder did you
12
say?
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
MS. CYR: Family Services and Labour.
THE COMMISSIONER: The province.
MS. CYR: The province. And then we had to
search out per diems because we couldn't actually obtain
funding for a lot of our services so I now charge per
diems, particularly child welfare, Corrections, both
federally and provincially. We have, out of those 60 beds,
34 are mandated for women leaving Correction. They are the
only beds available, in most cases in the prairies
federally and they are the only beds available provincially
for women leaving Corrections because there is no halfway
24
25
house mandated for women.
heavy --
And they oftentimes have
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
4
MS. ROUSSIN: Back up.
MS. CYR: -- CFS involvement. Women come in,
they're of the average age is about 26 years of age,
aboriginal women. Most women are treaty. Most women come
5
in with CFS involvement.
Their children may be in care as
6
voluntary surrender of guardianship, permanent wards.
We,
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
by the time they even get to us, that a lot of them are
lead very violent lives and things are fairly complex so
they're coming in and then they can stay with us up to
three years, and we'll work with them, providing long-term
supports, programs, services around healing, so that would
include family violence prevention programs, gang
prevention programs, healing ceremonies; it's a variety of
services that are based on their needs. The big changes --
we are in the middle of a child death inquest ourselves,
16
and have learned a lot.
We do work with a connection of
17
18
women's resources, that would include short term shelter
placements, resource centres and long term placements for
19
women.
And in the middle of our own inquest have had a
20
21
22
23
24
25
number of recommendations but we've made significant
changes in our practice, one of which, and we've heard
signs of safety come up several times, that we are moving
all our case management practice towards that.
We've added a number of positions to our
organization and a number of polyassurance mechanisms to
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
ensure that the breadth and depth of practice is, is at its
best quality.
3
THE COMMISSIONER:
How many employees do you
4
have?
5
MS. CYR:
Right now I've got 25, and we run beds
6
7
8
9
for up to 60 women. In most other facilities, whether they
be institutional facilities or shelter facilities, usually
have almost two to one staff, so you can see how short on
resources we are in order to do this kind of work for long
10
term.
We have some women who can't actually leave our
11
12
facilities until their day parole, temporary absence or
their warrant expiry dates happen.
13
We work, we work with CFS.
We do charge per
14
15
16
17
18
diems for children who stay with us who are the
guardianship of CFS. We provide 24/7 care. We -- all of
our sites are 24/7 staffed. We have safety plans in place.
We insist -- our issue with systems and our women
is that women aren't at the centre of their plans, neither
19
are their children.
The -- we get them often as
20
21
prescribes, so women will come in with the holy trinity of
addictions, parenting and anger management with very little
22
follow-up.
No one's accountable to the most vulnerable
23
people in the plan, which is very frustrating.
We've had
24
25
varieties of situation where workers have had difficulty
demonstrating safety or danger issues and based solely on
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
risk, and we certainly -- hence why we're introducing signs
of safety.
3
4
MS. WALSH:
the people most --
When you say no one's accountable to
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
MS. CYR: Workers don't --
MS. WALSH: -- what do you mean?
MS. CYR: -- call back our families. They don't
call them back.
MS. WALSH: Which workers? Who are you talking
about?
MS. CYR: Oh, CFS workers oftentime. Well,
Corrections does because they're mandated to. We don't get
13
call-backs.
We often have to chase workers down, and
14
15
that's, that's common. That's a common experience. We
usually record all of our meetings with child welfare
16
17
because we don't trust what the worker is telling us.
document absolutely everything.
We
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
We insist -- our case management practices are
within 30 days we have a full safety plan we start
developing through family group conferencing safety
networks, and that's the letter I'd submitted. With safety
networks we surround people, our women, with their --
everything from the workers to their family to their
partners in order to ensure that she's got safety as she
transitions through our services and back into the
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
community. That we, after 90 days we insist CFS works with
us, that they have to show up for the case planning.
3
Oftentimes CFS is the referral source.
They will refer
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
women to come to us in order for them to get their kids
back. They often view us as addictions treatment, which we
are not, but we are able to -- we work in a harm reduction
model. There just isn't a lot of safe places to go, and we
have moved a lot of our services more to a family in care
model.
We recognize that women need supports prior to
getting their children back and there needs to be good
reunification plans and safety networks developed around
them. Oftentimes women are set up for failure when they do
receive their children back and services and supports are
15
cut off.
Oftentimes, because there's medically complex
16
situations that they don't have resources elsewhere so CFS
17
is one of their only resources.
Because we, because we
18
19
20
21
22
serve province-wide they may not be from an urban centre,
they may be from a rural or remote community, so oftentimes
there will be CFS involved because that's the only way
they're going to get health services for their child.
So these are some of the experiences we, we have
23
in working with our women.
We've had a lot of successes.
24
25
We've served over 20,000 women and their children since we
-- since its inception, and a big focus is sustainability
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
for women and their children.
There's two fundamental shifts that I would
3
certainly see happening within our centres.
We're moving
4
5
6
from a risk model to a safety model. Risk isolates people.
If you feel CFS with their SDM tools -- and I can go on for
an hour about that -- people at risk, you isolate them.
7
You arrest them, you apprehend their children.
If you
8
9
10
11
build safety it means you have to build a network around
them, so we're taking that fundamental shift in our
practice.
And the second thing is creating economic
12
sustainability.
You can have communities or families
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
surrounded with supports and services; if they cannot feed
their children, if they cannot find work, if they cannot
find a means of income, you're setting them up for failure.
And so our goal, certainly, we're starting up the Violet
Nelson classroom, we have a number of economic development
initiatives for women that they can attend to, and one of
the number one conditions for women exiting Corrections,
even if they have children, is to work, and so we try to
meet those, those conditions as well.
MS. WALSH: Okay. Thank you very much.
A question for each of you, and you can determine
who's going to start. We've heard a great deal of evidence
throughout the inquiry about the new model of service
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
4
delivery that's being rolled out, differential response,
and one of the objectives of differential response has been
identified as enhancing capacity for agencies and community
service providers to respond to families diverted to
5
differential response family enhancement.
So my question
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
to you is, has anyone from the government or child welfare
service providers consulted with you and your agencies
about enhancing your capacity to respond to families,
either as part of differential response or otherwise?
MS. KNOL: Oh.
MS. CYR: No.
MS. TAYLOR: No.
MS. ROUSSIN: No.
MS. WALSH: Did each of you say no?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MS. CYR: Yes.
MS. ROUSSIN: Yes.
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
MS. WALSH: Yes. Okay. All right.
20
Let me ask you this:
Do you collaborate with
21
22
23
24
25
each other in any way in serving the community that you
serve?
MS. ROUSSIN: Absolutely.
MS. CYR: Yes.
MS. WALSH: Okay. So you all do that. All
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
right.
Let's find out individually how you do that, so
2
starting, say, with Sharon.
3
MS. TAYLOR:
Well, one, our families are very
4
5
mobile from the north or what we call the north end of the
city to our end, so they go back and forth, so there's that
6
collaboration, also being a member of CLOUT.
But I think
7
8
9
10
our families sort of define, you know, if we have a common
value base then it's easy to partner with places like
Andrews Street or Ma Mawi. It's about working together. I
don't know how to describe it because we just -- it just
11
is.
Like, you just know that it's safe, you know it's
12
13
14
respectful. We have the same values. Like I think we're
value driven, so we respect that the people that we're
serving are human beings, that they have potential, that
15
they have strengths and how do we work with it.
So you
16
17
start sort of gravitating to organizations that will assist
with that and work with your families in a respectful
18
empathetic way and see them as a human being.
So I don't
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
know, I don't think I'm describing it well but it basically
comes down to our values that we share and then it just
makes it easier to work with others.
And when I first started it's like, okay, you're
sort of testing to see where people sit, what are -- how do
they view the people that we're serving, do they see them
as a deficit, do they see them as a strength, because we
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
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S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
share certain values.
And then you just keep building on
2
3
it, so that's how I sort of collaborate with people.
MS. WALSH: Diane.
4
MS. ROUSSIN:
Yeah, maybe I'll jump in here and
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
just sort of speak for, for some of us at the table or all
of us at the table because we all participate in, in one
example, which is the Community Led Organizations United
Together.
MS. WALSH: So that's CLOUT.
MS. ROUSSIN: CLOUT coalition.
MS. WALSH: And that's a formal, then, coalition?
MS. ROUSSIN: Yes.
MS. WALSH: Okay.
14
MS. ROUSSIN:
So, and that formalized in about
15
16
2003-ish but really it's based on a longstanding
relationship that organizations have had, and like we've
17
historically worked together.
And like for some of us
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
around the table, we're, we're newer ED's but there's the
group of ED's that were before us and so those
relationships were there then. And so, you know, trying to
meet the needs of families in the community, you have to
work together, and that's just the way it is.
So in about 2003 there was a decision that -- in,
in -- that we needed to formalize that, you know, very
organic natural working relationship and that's why we came
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D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
up with the coalition.
And so now what we do, and so it's
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
nine organizations, and I'm going to read them off:
Andrews Street Family Centre, the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata
Centre, Ndinawe, Native Women's Transition Centre, North
End Women's Centre, Community Education Development
Association, Rossbrook House, Wolseley Family Place and
Wahbung Abinoonjiiag. And --
THE CLERK: Can you spell that?
MS. ROUSSIN: Wahbung? W-A-H-B-U-N-G, A-B-I-N --
10
11
oh, well, you can Google it.
pronounced.
Abinoonjiiag is, is how it's
12
13
THE CLERK: Yeah, I have that one.
MS. ROUSSIN: Okay. Is that the one you wanted?
14
Yeah.
15
16
So again, nine, or nine executive directors that
get together on a fairly regular basis and we'll do all
17
kinds of things.
So we'll -- if there's an issue going on
18
19
in the community, we'll get together and discuss it, we'll
figure out what needs to be done or what is being done, and
20
if there's something else that needs to be done.
And we
21
22
kind of look around the table and say, okay, who's got the
time, who's got the energy, who's got the resources, who's
23
got the capacity to deal with this.
And sometimes it's a
24
25
very formal sort of thing that we'll do and we'll put a
proposal together to that effect, or other times it'll be,
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okay, this is how we're going to deal with this situation
2
or this family or this whatever.
We all are constantly
3
participating on coalitions and networks and, you know,
4
coming to the table on all kinds of stuff.
So we -- you
5
know, and that's sort of outside of the CLOUT.
But I do
6
7
8
find what Sharon's talking about, the, the reason that
those nine organize -- why those specific nine
organizations, we all have a very similar philosophy-based
9
service model, you know.
We all believe in the capacity
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
building model, we all believe in the strengths-based
approach to working with families and that the families are
at the centre of, of the -- I mean, Ma Mawi doesn't do a
lot of case management but, you know, we do things like
family group conferencing where it's the family that
decides what they need and what they want, and then the
rest of us are workers, it's up to us to try and figure out
17
how to get what that family needs, right.
It's not the
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workers sitting around, planning things out for the family
and then presenting that to the family, it's the other way
around.
So, so again, you know, we'll, as executive
directors we'll get together and just vent with one
another, we are a source of support for one another. We'll
compare notes around organizations, like what's your health
benefit plan like, or what your HR stuff going on, you
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2
3
4
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know, like, we'll --
MS. TAYLOR: Or lack of.
MS. ROUSSIN: Yeah, like we'll share that kind of
expertise and knowledge with each other. Sometimes I know,
again, Ma Mawi administrates a large health benefit plan,
so some of the smaller organizations are coming under us to
7
get the leveraged benefit of a group plan.
So we find all
8
kinds of ways to work together and collaborate.
And it's,
9
10
most of it's focused on service delivery but there's also
our, our capacity as organizations and how we're pooling
11
that or how we're working on that.
And sometimes it
12
13
14
involves advocacy. If we just see something's flat out not
being done and, all right, let's all go down to city hall,
or, let's all go down to the leg., or, let's write the
15
letters, or, let's, you know, do the thing.
So we do some
16
of that as well, right.
Like because we're all for good
17
18
19
public policy and we're all for making policy work for
families and work for community, and that community voice
needs to be at the table, it can't be top-down kind of
20
21
22
problem-solving here.
problem-solving.
MS. WALSH:
Like it's got to be bottom-up
So it's fair to say that from your
23
24
25
perspective, your various perspectives, the community-based
organizations are collaborating?
MS. ROUSSIN: Absolutely --
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MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
MS. ROUSSIN: -- we have to.
MS. WALSH: And doing well --
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MS. ROUSSIN: We have to.
MS. WALSH: -- in that regard. Dilly?
MS. TAYLOR: We wouldn't exist if we didn't.
MS. ROUSSIN: Our, our funding can be very siloed
and it's up to us to figure out how to, you know, just make
that work.
11
MS. KNOL:
There was a time, I think, that
12
13
14
agencies kind of worked as islands by themselves because
they were so scared if they met with someone they might
lose some of their funding to another agency, that kind of
15
thing.
And instead, we work together to make sure we
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
continue to get our funding in hopes to get more, not to
say, I want this funding and I don't care if that agency
doesn't.
MS. ROUSSIN: Yeah.
MS. TAYLOR: Yeah.
MS. KNOL: You know, that kind of thing.
MS. ROUSSIN: We have clout.
MS. KNOL: We have clout.
24
MS. CYR:
There's larger networks, as well, we
25
all belong to because we serve the province as a whole, so
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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2
3
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we also have women's networks, health networks, addiction
networks that we all, that we would certainly sit on those
(inaudible) as well and bring them together with the goal
of making them accountable to the family, ensuring that
plans go forward even in those systems (inaudible).
6
MS. TAYLOR:
I counted, because I have to do my
7
8
annual report, that I had over a hundred and seventy-five
partners last year in some form or another that has worked
9
10
with us and worked with our families.
guys got counts.
And I'm sure you
11
MS. WALSH:
Mr. Commissioner, did you want to
12
take the afternoon break at this point?
13
THE COMMISSIONER:
Any time you suggest is a
14
15
16
17
18
convenient time. If this is the best time, we'll do it.
MS. WALSH: Would this be all right, then? We'll
take a --
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Sure.
MS. WALSH: We usually take a 15-minute break.
19
20
THE COMMISSIONER:
sitting beyond 5:00.
We, we can't -- we won't be
21
22
all stay to 5:00?
MS. WALSH: Right. Does that work for -- can you
23
MS. ROUSSIN:
We thought, it's Friday, let's go
24
to 6:00.
25
MS. WALSH: But will 5:00 be all right for all of
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S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
you?
2
3
4
MS. TAYLOR: Yeah.
MS. KNOL: Yeah.
MS. WALSH: If necessary. Okay.
5
THE COMMISSIONER:
If there are enough questions
6
7
to keep you going. Yeah, all right.
MS. WALSH: All right.
8
9
10
THE COMMISSIONER:
so you can step down and --
MS. ROUSSIN: Okay.
We'll take a 15-minute break,
11
12
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
THE COMMISSIONER: -- do whatever.
13
14
(BRIEF RECESS)
15
16
17
18
MS. WALSH: All right. We have an hour and a
half, thereabouts, to discuss everything else that you want
to discuss.
19
20
other questions.
THE COMMISSIONER:
But you got to leave time for
21
22
23
24
25
MS. WALSH: Yes. And that doesn't include just
questions from me. So there are four areas I want to cover
in, let's say an hour, so that we leave half an hour for
other questions from other perspectives.
The four areas that I want to cover are who,
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since you say that so far there's been no collaboration
from government, who within the government, which
department would you see the collaboration coming from?
The second one is -- and I know specifically
that, that one of you has views on to whom funding for
differential response from the government should be
directed.
The third is your views on why there is an
ongoing need for services, either from the child welfare
system or from the kinds of agencies that you all run, why
is the need increasing?
And the last one is your recommendations for the
Commissioner in fulfilling his mandate to better protect
Manitoba children.
So I've put them all out there so that you know
16
what we're facing in the next hour.
So let's start with
17
the first question.
And you may not all have views on
18
19
20
21
22
23
this, but if you were to turn to a department in the
government from whom you would expect to receive -- or with
whom you would expect to collaborate, where might that be
focused?
Perhaps, Bernice, you were previously the CEO of
the Métis authority, so maybe I'll start with you.
24
MS. CYR:
I would see collaboration happening in
25
the Healthy Child Manitoba mandate underneath the eight
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D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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ministers or deputy ministers that have received that
2
portfolio.
The reason being is that you've got different
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
systems affecting children at the policy level and an
operations level could be run through them whereas the
funding agreements continue to come through child welfare
(inaudible) Child Protection Branch, Family Services and
Labour. But I would see that actually being best venue for
quality assurance, the best venue for collaboration, not
that they're in charge of it but that they coordinate it,
and that there is equal power among all partners inclusive
11
of community agencies.
And, that the children's advocate
12
13
14
mandate be expanded to come under the Healthy Child mandate
to look at children's services throughout the province and
throughout all systems, not just child welfare.
15
THE COMMISSIONER:
Let me just ask you, what
16
17
contact do you have with the provincial child advocate now,
any one of the four of you?
18
MS. CYR:
Any contact I have with the provincial
19
20
21
children's advocate is on behalf of children who stay at
our residence that are not getting adequate services from
child welfare.
22
THE COMMISSIONER:
And, and what kind of service
23
24
do you get from that office for those on whose behalf you
seek it?
25
MS. CYR:
In the context of advocating against
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
child welfare.
So I would seek out, if the child is not
2
3
being treated fairly or what we perceive as fairness within
the child welfare system only, then we would contact the
4
children's advocate.
There is no other mechanism, if, if
5
6
7
8
9
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12
13
children are being treated unfairly in schools or at home.
THE COMMISSIONER: Do you find you get results?
MS. CYR: That's to be seen.
THE COMMISSIONER: To be seen?
MS. CYR: Yeah.
THE COMMISSIONER: Okay. Any, any others want to
comment just on my inquiry about the child advocate's
office? And I raise that because you made a recommendation
with respect to it. And what was that recommendation?
14
MS. CYR:
The recommendation is to expand the
15
16
17
18
scope of the children's advocate, move them under the
Healthy Child Manitoba mandate, to view and review and
quality assure on behalf of children all systems that
affect children.
19
20
recorded so ...
THE COMMISSIONER:
Fortunately this is all being
21
22
MS. CYR: I can own that statement.
MS. KNOL: Yeah.
23
THE COMMISSIONER:
Yeah, oh, no, no, I don't say
24
that for that reason.
I want to get the full, what you
25
said in full, and I'll be able to get it from the
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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transcript. That's why I said that.
2
MS. WALSH:
Probably because I gave you a time
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
constraint, I expect that you're speaking quickly and it's
difficult to --
MS. CYR: Okay.
MS. WALSH: -- take notes. But, so the
Commissioner is just saying that thankfully this is all
being recorded so that we can all read it carefully.
THE COMMISSIONER: That's exactly right.
MS. WALSH: Yes. Diane, did you want to speak
to, to the concept or to the notion of with whom in
government you would see collaboration taking place?
13
MS. ROUSSIN:
Well, that's a little bit of a
14
15
16
difficult question because it seems to imply something
singular and most of us have like multiple funders, right,
so I -- our organization can often get frustrated with the
17
different levels of government, you know.
So, you know,
18
19
20
21
22
23
having a single sort of point of collaboration within, say,
the province would, I guess, because again, I've received
funding from many different provincial departments, so
trying to think that one through, but I also receive
federal funding, I receive City of Winnipeg funding, and
those three levels don't often -- you know, their funding
24
sources don't collaborate.
So, if there was a way to get
25
all funders together to really understand how
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
4
5
entrepreneurial we need to be in making the funding work,
because families are families, you know, and they're
holistic and they're coming in with all kinds of things
that they need addressed and, and they don't silo
themselves up and so you can't have service that's all
6
siloed.
But behind the scenes, like I can sometimes draw
7
8
9
10
the line where that funding ends and that funding -- you
know, for the same person, right, like it's, it can't be --
You know, I have a funder who will fund cultural stuff and,
you know, will fund a sweat lodge but won't fund it beyond
11
the Perimeter.
And I'm like, well, we don't have sweat
12
13
14
15
16
17
lodges in the city, I don't know how we're supposed to make
that work. Anyway, things like that, right. So it's more,
you know, then you get the foundations and, you know, so I
think we know how we would like that funding to work for us
as an organization. How all those funders could
potentially coordinate or collaborate themselves, that
18
would be a dream, yeah.
I don't know -- I'm trying to
19
20
21
think through how that might work but ...
MS. WALSH: Sharon?
MS. TAYLOR: Yeah. I'm a mix, too, having
22
multiple funding.
But if I was looking -- if you're just
23
24
25
talking the province, I would say Healthy Child because
they have eight or nine ministers that sit there and it
gives them the mandate to look holistically at families. I
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
like the fact that Healthy Child goes from zero to 18, so
2
that.
But on another hand, I'm looking at that I don't
3
4
want anybody to be in charge, I want where we come to the
table, where we are valued and respected as an equal
5
partner because we do do the front line.
I am so tired of
6
being at meetings where we're consulted but it's after the
7
fact, to validate what they want to implement.
It's about
8
bring us in at the beginning and work with us there.
So I
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
would say, if I'm just looking provincially, because I also
have federal funding which brings up a whole bunch of other
different issues, but provincially it would be Healthy
Child because they have the mandate zero to 18 and they do
look, there's enough ministers with a diverse portfolio
there to look holistically at children if it was done in a
good way.
16
MS. WALSH:
And so you're saying collaboration
17
18
means being an equal partner?
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
19
MS. WALSH:
Which, of course, is what we heard
20
21
22
23
24
from Shauna MacKinnon and the study that I think probably
many of you participated in, the results of community-based
organizations' views on, I think the topic was
accountability, and you talked about needing to be an equal
partner.
25
MS. ROUSSIN:
It was about who gets to define
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
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S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
what accountability is.
MS. TAYLOR: Yeah.
3
MS. ROUSSIN:
Like more and more reporting and
4
5
more and more whatever does -- it can sometimes relate to
accountability but often it relates to more bureaucracy.
6
Like, who are you accountable to?
I mean, we are
7
accountable to funders but we're also accountable to our
8
community.
Our services have to be accountable to the
9
10
11
12
community we serve.
MS. WALSH: So are you saying when you want to be
an equal partner, are you talking at the level of funding
decisions? Policy decisions?
13
MS. TAYLOR:
Well, policy decisions, for sure.
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
But before it even gets to policy, if they're even thinking
about how you provide best services to the families, it's
about bring us in at that starting stage before you
implement something.
I also have to be cautious because of my multiple
funders, it's like I wished in a way they would come to the
table together and sit down and work with me in an equal
way to say, how can we best provide services to this
22
community.
They do all this work behind my back and then
23
pull me in to say that this is sort of what they've agreed
24
to.
And I would like to be there at the forefront because
25
I'm not opposed to them meeting. And when I initially --
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D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
MS. WALSH: Now, who is "them"? Who are these
2
funders?
3
MS. TAYLOR:
Well, I'm looking at foundations,
4
because I have foundations, I have federal funding and I
5
have provincial funding as major funders.
And at the
6
7
8
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10
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beginning, they came to the table but they've never come to
the table since as a group to sit there and say, okay, what
are your needs now and how can we best provide that
service; and if they have, they'll turn around and they'll
say, well, you get a thousand dollars for administration so
the rest of them don't have to give me any money. And it's
like, but my costs are higher than that, how can we work
together in a good way if -- so, so there's multiple
issues, I think, around, when we're talking about who's
responsible to who. I don't know if ...
16
MS. WALSH:
Dilly, I saw you nod your head when
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
someone raised the issue of funding coming from provincial
and federal sources. Is that an issue?
MS. KNOL: Well, it certainly, well, I guess it's
not -- it's just the reporting is completely different
sometimes and that, so I've just learned to do work plan
for all my programs, so you've learnt that you might as
well go the extra mile to get your accountability and
everything in because they're eventually going to ask for
25
it anyway.
One asks for it, and then they change things.
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D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
So their accountability is different.
Like, some people
2
3
really just want numbers and some people really want the
stories, you know, the parents' stories about -- and see
4
that as, as valuable information and that.
So I think the
5
6
7
8
9
province is more, they're listening more to the, the
participants and stuff and the workers, but I think the
feds are still wanting numbers, and I've a problem with
numbers because, you know, 50 people came today may look
good but maybe there were 10,000 that could have come so 50
10
doesn't look good, you know what I mean.
So you could use
11
those numbers any way you want to, so I have a problem with
12
numbers.
I mean I'm accountable, totally so accountable,
13
14
it's so crazy accountable.
MS. WALSH: Um-hum.
15
MS. KNOL:
That so much of the time is spent
16
17
18
being accountable and doing reports and everything and then
you're still dealing with a non-profit, you're dealing with
staff, you don't have a million -- I got 28 staff. I'm the
19
executive director and I have a finance manager.
That's
20
who takes care of the day to day, you know, staffing stuff
21
and everything else.
Plus I do -- community comes to me
22
because my door is open.
So, and that's the way I learn
23
because I want to know what's happening in all my programs
24
in the centre.
I don't want to just be the boss over here
25
because that's how I think the system works.
I'm the boss
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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over here and I'm taking care of all these programs but I
have no idea how those programs are working or if my
families really do get them, even though I get numbers.
But I do, I know how it's working because I go to my
programs and I'm there every day to check to see how things
are going in between meetings and reports and everything
else. But if you believe in your community and you believe
in what you're doing as an agency, I believe we are making
9
a difference.
If we had more resources we could make a
10
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bigger difference.
MS. WALSH: Okay. So maybe that takes us to the
next topic, which is the topic of to whom should -- well,
it was specifically differ -- money for differential
response funding, which is -- but I mean, that is what,
what you are all doing, is you're not doing protection
work, you're doing what --
MS. TAYLOR: (Inaudible).
18
MS. WALSH:
-- the child welfare system calls
19
family enhancement work.
So what, what recommendations
20
does each of you have regarding funding in terms of, of
21
better supporting your work?
Do you want to go back in
22
23
24
25
reverse order. So we'll start with you, Dilly.
MS. KNOL: Okay, differential response, I mean, I
like the idea of seeing it because I think the first spot
is the community, because families build a relationship
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D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
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with the community and, and, and people that work in
community, so that we're there all the time, we're not
there just once in a blue moon to support them kind of
thing. We're there to support them all the time. So I
think if we got money, a family comes, says, why can't I
have more money so I can make sure I have the child care I
7
need for the parent to take parenting.
You want your
8
parents to get skills but you won't -- there's so many
9
boundaries in the way for them to get those kills.
They
10
have three kids at home.
How can they go into a parenting
11
program every day?
Who's going to take care of the
12
children, and you know, which becomes an issue or
13
everything.
Transportation is an issue, you know, those
14
kind of thing. I wish they would just give us extra money,
15
know we work with families and that.
My fear is that if I
16
17
have to start keeping files on families that I, that I work
with in order to get money, then keep your money because
18
that's not going to help my families.
My families are not
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
going to come to my centre because they're going to lose
trust because they're going to feel that I work for CFS not
Andrews Street Family Centre. And, and they do want -- you
know, if they -- because I read about it and stuff like
that, and I'm just saying, if I have to open a file to a
family that drops in, in order to get some money to get
extra child care or to get extra bus tickets or to be able
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to do home visit, have more people doing home visits and
those supports at home and stuff like that, my families are
not going to trust me, they're not going to come to my
centre. So they need to trust. We have so many families.
Talk to the families and, and see, because you're referring
6
them to us, you're not paying for that referral.
You know
7
what I mean?
It's -- we're there to do this programming,
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we have money for that, and we get real -- very creative
and with our volunteers and what we get and stuff in order
to make ends meet for our families, you know, because
11
boundaries is big for our families, too.
They like things
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local and they need to have access to phone, access to
child care, access to transportation, which, like Child and
Family Service said, oh, you have to go to parenting over
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there but they don't give them bus tickets.
So we got to
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give them bus tickets in order for them to come, which I
don't really have the money to do that, but if that mom
wants to come and become a better parent, I'm going to give
her a bus ticket, you know what I mean. So I mean, I think
non-profits, we'll take money out of our pockets to help
because we believe in -- you know, there's got to be
holistic, it's got to be, it's got to be programmed for
family, which means there is no age zero to six in a
24
family.
Family goes, like you got kids till they're a
25
hundred, you know, kind of thing.
Your kids always come
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home, so ...
MS. WALSH: Okay. Thank you.
Sharon?
4
5
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question was.
MS. TAYLOR:
MS. WALSH:
I'm trying to think what the
The question was recommendations with
7
8
respect to funding to better promote the work that you're
doing.
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MS. TAYLOR:
I think what I would like is to be
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able to have wrap-around services for every family, and to
be --
MS. WALSH: What does that mean?
MS. TAYLOR: Wrap-around services, what I mean is
where the family is the centre; the family decides what
sort of the needs are and that you're able to work on it.
So if we know that a family has substance abuse, it's like,
okay, what do they define as the goal to be able to achieve
18
that end?
We don't usually have absolute answers but it's
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20
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about stages, it's like, okay, somebody may be on crack but
it like, okay, we're not dealing with -- they'll say it's
an issue and then we start weeding them down to be able to,
to the point where they may be using weed, and that to us
23
is a benefit in a way.
It's about, I think it's about
24
having the family always at the centre.
It's not about
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that we're the experts but we are an expert in a way.
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Like, I always think we minimize ourselves when we don't
say we're the experts because we do have knowledge and our
families have been able to show change because you work
with them, because they've been able to define the goal.
So --
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7
MS. WALSH:
wrap-around services.
So you said you want funding for
8
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
9
MS. WALSH:
So what does -- you've told us what
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11
wrap-around services are. What's the funding
recommendation that you have or what's your need?
12
MS. TAYLOR:
I, I would say just being able to
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provide us with long term funding, being able to -- versus
short term. Like I, I would love to know -- and also to be
able to have increases every now and then would be really
nice, but it would be tied in with the family and providing
the services to that family and being able to, be able to
18
expand.
Like Dilly, when she's talking about not having
19
bus tickets, like we're always trying to figure out ways to
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get transportation for families.
We're always sort of
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22
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scraping at the bottom in a way, so it would be nice to
have secure funding that allowed even to even sustain
staff, because I, I am going through now where staff are
leaving because we pay so little and they're going on to
25
other higher paying jobs.
Like so when you're talking
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about funding, it's about long-term stable funding to be
able to say, we can work with a family from the beginning
to the end and be able to, through whatever transition,
because families that are going through change, it's a long
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6
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process so it's not a quick fix for families.
say that's how I would like to see the funding.
MS. WALSH: Okay. Thank you.
Diane?
So I would
9
MS. ROUSSIN:
I think probably what you're
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11
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hearing up here is we know what we do, we know the kind of
funding we need and would like to have and we know that
there are certain characteristics of what we would deem,
13
you know, good funding.
And so I think we're very clear
14
about what that is.
Where it comes from is a little less
15
16
clear to me, and I, you know, when I'm talking to funders I
don't -- it's up to them to figure where it's going to come
17
from.
They know their system, I don't, right, and so I'm
18
just trying to communicate about the kind of funding that
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20
we think works for families and works for communities.
needs to look like what you've heard here already.
It
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24
25
So, so I know your question was specifically
around the differential response and the, the family
enhancement, but like I think the families that we see, you
know, we know that we're working within this context of
systemic issues and we know that there's, you know,
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historic and current oppression and discrimination and
racism and, you know, residential schools and, and sixties
scoop and all that stuff is poverty, you know, and those
are the conditions that our families are struggling in, and
so how do you deal with that stuff within your centres,
because they're coming in the door with that, and trying to
deal with them in a positive way so that it doesn't get so
-- the situation doesn't get so degraded, you know, that
we're into child protection and family breakdown or
violence or, you know, incarceration and things like that.
So we know that we want to -- I know at the Ma Mawi Wi Chi
Itata Centre, for the kind of funding we get, the services
that I provide that are directly related to kids who are in
the care of the CFS, the group homes, the, the foster
families and everything else, that funding is way more
stable and way more at a, at a higher level than another
set of services that we provide, which is like the youth
leadership programs or the youth mentorship programs.
Again, the, the in-care funding, it's, it's stable, it's a
five-year agreement, you know, unusually renewed every five
21
years unless something really fell off the map.
The youth
22
23
leadership stuff, the youth mentorship, the -- you know,
that kind of stuff, I'm hunting it down every year.
24
Sometimes it's only for six months.
You know, and we're
25
constantly juggling, you know, many plates in the air to
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get that kind of -- and stitching it together is very
piecemeal, it's very project-based, you know, again, where
the other stuff is more, it's, you know, what we would call
the core funding, right. And so when you have core funding
it doesn't -- it allows you to be a bit more innovative,
you know, when you're dealing because there isn't any one
7
problem that everybody faces, you know.
Everyone's coming
8
9
in with something just a little bit different and you got
to have enough room to move to be able to deal with those
10
situations.
And a lot of what families come in for, most
11
12
organizations don't have their -- like (inaudible)
emergency service stuff, like most of us don't have budgets
13
to deal with that.
Like, people need -- they're going to
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get evicted, they don’t have another damage deposit, you
know, they don't have money to move their stuff, they don't
have somewhere to store their stuff, they don't -- you
know, there's, there's these very common sorts of things
that none of us get funding for and so you're trying to
figure out how you can, you know, piece things together to
deal with some of that in between the cracks.
So I think core funding allows you to be a bit
more innovative to deal with some of those situations.
There needs to be more of an emphasis on how we fund
preventative pieces versus sort of just the intervention.
Because I -- like we're downstream here. Like, I mean, how
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many kids in care? Like really, this is just going to keep
going. Like, how do we get upstream of that?
I think that, you know, again, we all work from
that strength-base model and again, as an organization I am
funded -- you know, I have to show that there's a need out
there and there's a deficit out there, and so I have to ask
a funder to fund that deficit to -- so people can get out
of that deficit and that weakness situation.
If I go around saying families are strong and
great, I need funding for that, no one's going to fund
11
that, right, but that needs funding.
I mean, that's the
12
strength-based approach.
This is -- this family is on the
13
cusp but here's what they're good at and here's what they
14
need a little bit more of.
You know, the good stuff,
15
right.
Because we all know that healthy communities are
16
17
18
built on, it's built on the strength of its members, not on
the weaknesses of its members, and so --
MS. WALSH: Right.
19
MS. ROUSSIN:
-- how do we build the strengths.
20
21
22
And so most funding models, you know, this is not --
there's not any one funder that is not guilty of this, I
mean we, we fund deficits, we don't fund strengths, right.
23
24
MS. WALSH:
of prevention funding?
But that's what you would call part
25
MS. ROUSSIN: Yeah. Yeah. So and that's so, for
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Ma Mawi, we have a very large volunteer program.
And
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3
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again, you know, people come in the door because they need
a little bit of help with this or that or the other, but
they would rather volunteer their time or do the odd job
type thing in order to get the meal or to get that Pampers,
or whatever, versus just coming and saying, I need Pampers,
7
like you know, versus just being given something.
They
8
would rather earn it.
And, and so, and then, you know,
9
that makes them feel good, they're building skills, they're
10
building resume.
We do all kinds of training for people
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from food handlers to CPR, you know, all that stuff that
goes on a résumé that gets them in the door to employment.
And because they've been volunteering in our centres for so
long, you know, we get to know who they are and we can be
references for them and we refer on to our sister
organizations.
And then we're trying to build inroads, and the
one I'll mention in particular is like the City of
19
Winnipeg.
We have a youth program with them where, you
20
21
know, we're working as the community organization, we're
building the skills of the young people, working
22
individually with the young because we do that well.
The
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25
city is doing some stuff internally to make sure that those
kids then have jobs within the city, like good paying jobs,
from animal services to the bylaw enforcement to you name
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it, and we're trying to create pathways into the civic
system for our aboriginal youth to be -- because there was
barriers all over the place before and we're trying to pull
4
those barriers down.
So -- you know, and that's where
5
6
people are at.
school --
People want to work, they want to go to
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8
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10
MS. WALSH: Sure.
MS. ROUSSIN: -- they want to do better. They
don't, you know, want to just sort of be sitting there
taking all the time, and so how do we do that as
11
organizations and how does the funding fit that?
It
12
doesn't really.
We just have to be really creative about
13
14
how we make that work.
MS. WALSH:
So you need more funding for
15
prevention on sustained basis?
16
MS. ROUSSIN:
Yes, like the -- also funding
17
levels.
Like again, the -- you know, if we look -- if I
18
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compare any of our workers to folks who are in the child
welfare system, the wage parity, oh, it's ridiculous, you
20
know.
Like, we can't pay our people the way -- and, you
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22
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24
25
know, and I don't have a turnover issue at Ma Mawi, I think
it's because the way we deliver the service, but man, I pay
my people poorly. Like, it would be nice to be able to pay
them properly.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
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Bernice?
MS. TAYLOR: A 16-year-old kid that lives in B.C.
3
makes more than I pay my outreach workers.
And he's just
4
5
working for the summer. That's a big statement.
MS. WALSH: Bernice? Thank you. Bernice?
6
MS. CYR:
My opinion on differential response
7
funding has been the moment it was announced many years ago
8
is that it needs to be vetted through the community.
Now,
9
I'm talking provincially.
The north end has a luxury that
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it has an urban centre where you could target a number of
resources, but there's a number of provincial communities
that don't have any family services at all. And what winds
up happening is that they become -- we talk about increases
in child welfare, well, if you don't have medical services
you don't have anti-poverty services or poverty alleviation
services or housing, you're going to have a significant
17
over-representation in child welfare.
That's just -- the
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20
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evidence is out there. So I would like to see D.R. funding
go and be vetted through community organizations, both
urban and rurally; that I would like to see funding be
harmonized with other funding agreements like Family
Services and Labour, whether that be community programs,
child welfare, family violence prevention, that they become
managed on five-year business plans that are created by the
agency, that is about meeting the needs of their families
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and those communities and that reporting mechanisms are
reported through those business plans, would provide longer
3
term sustainability, a level of accountability.
But the
4
5
6
7
piece of the business plans, when you have outcomes and
targets, is that you can actually have them as not just
compliancy-driven but as quality drive, but we have to move
to a place in this province where we're not just looking at
8
the numbers or just saying it's a compliancy issue.
We
9
have to look at the practice deficit we have in this
10
11
province, and that's what it is.
it --
And if we're not keeping
12
MS. WALSH: What do you mean by that?
13
MS. CYR:
Well, what I mean by that, and I'll
14
just be blunt, in my experience in, in -- when we have wage
15
parity, how do we compete with hiring staff?
How do we
16
retain good staff?
I've worked with many staff in
17
18
19
20
different systems that were inadequately trained, that the
difference between -- and you had mentioned, Diane, why do
staff stay in non-profits when you're not paying them.
It's because you can rally them around the cause. In child
21
welfare, try rallying staff around the cause.
It's very,
22
very difficult.
They're not as committed or motivated and
23
that has been my direct experience.
Whereas in community
24
25
agencies, because people tend to live and work in their
same community, tend to be pretty motivated about ensuring
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that that community is sustainable.
So when we look at
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funding plans, there are a number of provincial communities
that, that are in desperate need for family resource
centres, however that may look, that D.R. funding, once
it's sort of diverted I would see it as going through
Healthy Child, through the portfolios, I would see that --
we have to name what the goal is in funding. What is, what
is it that the goals that the province have been looking
for? They haven't been very clear on that. It's -- under
the legislation it's very broad under the safety of
children, which that broad definition has certainly led to
12
a number of issues around neglect.
And (inaudible) get
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14
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into that whole other piece, but the other piece is what's
the goal. Another needs to be reinvestment policy; that if
we have a five-year business plan and we're able to
demonstrate, as an organization, that we can effectively
and efficiently use those funds, we don't want the province
coming back and either reducing our funding or clawing us
back. We want to be able to reinvest those funds back into
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21
quality services.
of child welfare.
The goal should not be keeping kids out
The goal should be keeping kids safe,
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being able to offer kids better opportunities, seeing
increased health determinates, having better dental care.
That's the things we need to see.
The reason why -- and I know this question was
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asked of Brad McKenzie, and the reason why we have such an
increase in the number of kids in child welfare is because
the systems breaking down on our families all over the
place, family systems, community systems, education
systems, health systems. In this province -- and I've done
a lot of development work in both Alberta and B.C. -- in
this province the child welfare system, the legislation,
the way it is set up, has created this net and child
welfare scoops up everything that didn't work out in other
systems, and that's been my experience and what I've seen.
So when we talk about funding it really has to move to what
is the goal of the province as a whole, what is the goal
13
for our children, how are we managing this.
And the level
14
15
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17
of accountability can't just be about numbers, it has to be
about quality and access to services.
MS. WALSH: Thank you. Which I think takes us to
the third topic, and that is the numbers that, of children
18
19
in care are increasing.
around for a long time.
Your organizations have been
The need doesn't seem to be going
20
21
away; in fact, a need for services seems to be increasing.
Why do you think that is?
22
MS. ROUSSIN:
I can just jump in and just
23
reiterate what I said earlier, like we're building systems
24
and putting all the resources on a deficits model.
Like,
25
you look at the jail -- and I'm speaking primarily from an
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indigenous perspective and about our indigenous kids,
because you look at the jails, our kids are incarcerated,
like way over, over-representatively. And how much does it
cost to incarcerate a kid for a year versus what if we put
that same amount of money into a youth leadership program,
6
you know.
How much does it cost to have a child in child
7
welfare for a year, you know, could you not put that into a
8
family support service instead?
And so I think it's how
9
we're, we're funding the deficit model.
And so like it
10
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15
just -- I don't know how you flip it but it needs to be
flipped and I think, you know, that's where, where the work
we do, and we just feel like we're under-funded and like
funded at a lower level to do what seems to me the more
investment type work.
MS. WALSH: Sharon.
16
MS. TAYLOR:
This is more, don't know how to
17
18
19
20
phrase this, but I looked up child protection's mandate and
it was interesting because it said that it was to build the
strengths to care for families and to create a good
relationship with a child and engage the community in
21
resolving issues.
And what I found interesting was that
22
23
the majority of kids that are in care now is under neglect.
And when I think of neglect I sit there and start thinking
24
of the system in neglect.
We don't have living wages, we
25
have really poor housing, we have really -- people living
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in poverty and we don't seem to, to find that as neglect.
And I think if we were to take care of some of those issues
like housing, poverty, discrimination, all of those issues,
the systemic ones, I think we need to start there in a way
to be able to make big change. So to me, the system should
be charged with neglect sometimes and not our families but
the system should be because it's not taking care of kids'
8
basic needs.
The kids that I see, the families are
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working, they are so resourceful in the limited resources
that they have but that level of not being able to feed
their kids well, dress their kids well, transportation, all
those costs never seem to go away. They seem to be getting
13
bigger.
And so we're not providing enough care to our
14
kids, and to me -- or the families because kids come with a
15
family.
And let's talk about that we need to support
16
17
families at the same time as we support children, and
that's where, as family resource centres, we're able to
18
take care of the whole unit.
So I, I want to charge the
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20
21
22
system with neglect, because until they start taking care
of some of those issues and stop blaming the victim for not
being able to take the best care of their children, I, I
just believe that at the bottom of my heart would be one of
23
the first steps:
let's talk about adequate housing, let's
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25
talk about living wages, let's not talk about cutting taxes
and who that benefits, and child credits that we give
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people.
I'm going on a rant, but I think -- I don't think
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3
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our families are not doing the best that they can for their
kids.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
Dilly?
6
MS. KNOL:
Can I just say that I think we do
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8
9
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12
13
things holistically so we're looking at housing, we're
looking at nutrition, we're looking, so Child and Family
Services only looks at the one kind of thing and, and they
say, ooh, you don't have good food and you don't have good
housing so you can't have your children because it's not
adequate. But help them find good housing. Like I always
say, why doesn't Child and Family Services own housing to
14
put their families in?
This way we're not dealing with
15
16
17
slum landlords maybe and, and they'd be responsible for
taking care of the house, and if they're not taking care of
the house, Child and Family Service would know about it and
18
maybe teach them how to take care of a house.
Like it's
19
little things like that.
You got to remember, we weren't
20
born with all these skills.
Some people were lucky to be
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born in a family that their parent showed them and there
were enough resources to be able to show your child how to
grow and work is important, but if you haven't had that,
you're just not born with that information.
And I just -- because this has been burning me
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
3
since I've heard Dr. McKenzie say this, he said that
prevention shouldn't be given to community agencies that we
couldn't do a good job on prevention, it should stay with
4
Child and Family Services.
Hello, people, how long has it
5
been with Child and Family Services?
It's not working
6
there.
So I bet if you gave it to the community and gave
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8
9
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us a chance to take care of prevention, that you would
actually see some results. Sorry but I had to get that off
my chest.
MS. WALSH: Bernice, the ongoing need, the need's
not going away, it's increasing?
12
MS. CYR:
I think it's been, I think it's been
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14
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16
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covered and I've said my --
MS. WALSH: Okay.
MS. CYR: -- last round, is lack of system.
MS. WALSH: Thank you. So to an extent with the
fourth question you've given an answer but I want to give
18
you one last opportunity.
The mandate of this inquiry is
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20
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23
for the Commissioner to make recommendations to better
protect Manitoba children so I want to give each of you an
opportunity to make some suggestions, some recommendations
for the Commissioner to consider.
Bernice, do you want to start?
24
MS. CYR:
I would, excuse me, I would certainly
25
expand the scope of the children's advocate in all systems.
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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2
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I would narrow legislation around and define abuse and
define neglect a little bit better in legislation, meaning
that there's a number of neglect cases that could come
through preventative services like community agencies
instead of all being processed through as protection
6
concerns.
I think that we have to work better on the
7
referral sources, so schools and health care providers
8
under the Disclosures Act.
There needs to be better
9
clarification around how and where to refer, when there --
10
have concerns around children and their families.
That
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there needs to be a better front-end system for triaging.
I know ANCR has done their, their best as far as that goes,
but intake is inconsistent throughout this province. There
has not been a direct intake agency review done in several
15
years.
There's still outstanding recommendations that need
16
to happen at those intake agencies.
We have a combination
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of in-house and stand-alone intake agencies that are very
consistent in their application, delivery of legislation.
That we need better quality of practice and we need
practice compliancy, so we need to look at better services
and what our workers are actually offering, because our
22
system is only as good as its weakest worker.
And that's
23
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just, that's just how it is.
recommendations I would make.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
Those would be some
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
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Diane?
MS. ROUSSIN:
I think that there could be, well,
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there should be sort of a better intersection between
community-based services and the child welfare system. And
the example that I, again, will refer to is the CLOUT
coalition. So the way that we deliver the service, the way
that we view our families, the way that we work with our
families and then how the service flows from that value
base I think is something that works for families. And so,
you know, I say we're here, we've been here for quite a
while, we have quite a capacity and an infrastructure
already developed and I think there's an opportunity there
for, you know, the child welfare system to, to work with
14
the community-based agencies like that.
You know, again,
15
16
there's a time and a place for child protection,
absolutely, and we need people who can do that really,
17
really well.
And I think there's, you know, around the
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family support and the family working with families, I
think there's a lot of us around the table that have a
pretty sophisticated experience and expertise in doing that
work and so I say we're here and I think our doors are open
and we're ready to share that with whoever will listen.
You know, and we've very much grounded in local
solutions and so, you know, while there's always something
to learn from an international model, you know, that worked
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
somewhere else in the world, we know what works right here
in our neighbourhoods. You know, we're very neighbourhood-
3
based organizations.
We all operate from that community
4
5
6
7
8
economic development lens whereby the families that we're
actually working with and serving often will start working
within our organizations and will move into the marketplace
or into education systems because they've, you know,
developed themselves, you know, to a point where they're
9
ready to, to take that step.
And we always are -- that's
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11
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always our goal, right, it's never stops at just the
services, it's, it's okay, we got to work on all of our
capacities of community and so the goal is always to keep
it moving, right.
And so, you know, I think that it involves a lot
of dialogue and I think it involves like true engagement,
16
like not consultation.
We got to get past consultation.
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18
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We got to get into engagement, which again is, there's a
reciprocal nature to that.
And we spend a lot of time amongst ourselves
talking about what's needed and I think we're, we are here
today even, you know, offering that up, so we need to
22
collaborate.
Again, there's -- I think of pockets of the
23
24
25
collaboration and so there needs to be better collaboration
among those pockets, so that's what I would recommend.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
2
Sharon?
MS. TAYLOR:
I think the most telling thing is,
3
4
for me is that many of our families say that they -- if it
wasn't for organizations like ours they do not know if
5
they'd have their children.
To me, that's a big marker
6
that we're doing something right with our kids.
I think
7
8
9
10
that if I was looking at a direct service as far as
families, it starts with them in the centre and us being
able to facilitate the best possible way to have them reach
their fullest potential and their children reach their
11
fullest potential.
I also believe that all of us have to
12
sit at the table as equals, not consultation; it's about
13
true engagement where we are actively involved.
And we do
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15
16
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know the difference when we're being tolerated versus being
truly accepted for what we have to say.
I think, on the other hand, I really think that
in this day and age we have to look at the bigger issues
that are barriers to our families and look at the effects
19
20
of poverty and discrimination.
whole piece that has to go on.
I still think there's that
21
22
And I think we have to start looking at us as
organizations that we do operate because we are (inaudible)
23
base but it works.
Our families are telling us that it
24
works.
We have enormous amount of families that come to
25
our organizations that are not in the system, and then how
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B.A. CYR - DR.EX. (WALSH) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - DR.EX. (WALSH)
S.E. TAYLOR - DR.EX. (WALSH)
D.M. KNOL - DR.EX. (WALSH)
1
do we support the families?
Because I'm not naïve to not
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say that there isn't, at some point, that families may need
support that's beyond them and maybe the children do need
to be protected, but what would that protection look like
in a way that was really holistically talking to the family
as to what it would need, like as far as them. So I always
think you go to the source and ask them what they need.
And we've been very successful because we listen to what
they have to say.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
Dilly?
MS. KNOL: Okay. A recommendation is I think
agencies, community agencies should have the prevention
money and it shouldn't be in the hands of CFS because the
families don't trust CFS because they have the ability to
16
take your child way.
So I think that if you really want
17
prevention -- and CFS really, I can't blame it on all --
18
they've got a lot to do.
So all they end up doing is the
19
crisis and the apprehension and the things like that
20
because they don't have time to do the prevention.
So
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22
23
24
25
seriously, if you don't have time to do the prevention, do
a good job at the apprehension and taking care of the kids
at that point, but let the community then do the prevention
so the families don't have to get CFS.
MS. WALSH: Thank you. Those are my questions,
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
3
Mr. Commissioner. Thank you, ladies.
please.
THE COMMISSIONER: All right. Mr. Gindin,
4
5
6
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR. GINDIN:
MR. GINDIN: Good afternoon. For the record, my
7
name is Jeff Gindin.
I represent Steve Sinclair, who is
8
the biological father of Phoenix Sinclair, and Kim Edwards,
9
who was the godmother.
First of all, I won't be accusing
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any of you of holding anything back, make that clear at the
outset.
Now, I understand that actually some of you
actually have a bachelor of social work; am I correct?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: I think, Ms. Knol, you have one?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: Correct? And Ms. Roussin, am I
right?
MS. ROUSSIN: Yep.
MR. GINDIN: I'm not sure of the others. No?
Okay.
We were talking about the interaction you have
23
24
25
with CFS and you all expressed your opinions of that.
take it you were talking about Winnipeg --
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Yes.
I
- 192 -

B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
MR. GINDIN:
-- in particular or, or outside of
2
Winnipeg?
3
4
MS. CYR: Outside.
MR. GINDIN: Outside of Winnipeg, as well? All
5
right.
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7
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THE COMMISSIONER: You have to say yes.
MS. CYR: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: Okay. And Ms. Knol, you made it
quite clear that you felt that they didn't show you the
respect that you deserve. Do you all feel that way? Some
of you seem to --
MS. CYR: No.
MR. GINDIN: No? And your opinion is based on
the fact that they don't collaborate with you as much as
you would like?
MS. KNOL: Yes. And maybe it's because my
agencies might be a little different because, as I said
before, I hire from the community so they may not have
degrees and stuff like that, so, and I'm thinking that's
one of the reasons why the workers don't feel that my
parent support workers are important enough to be involved
in the situation.
23
MR. GINDIN:
And you mentioned the fact that at
24
25
least the families you deal with sometimes complain that
they're not getting called back by the social workers and I
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
see other people nodding their heads.
Is it necessary for
2
3
4
you sometimes to actually call CFS yourself on behalf of
families?
MS. KNOL: Absolutely.
5
MR. GINDIN:
So do you also experience not being
6
7
8
9
10
called back as quickly as you would like and --
MS. KNOL: Only once.
MR. GINDIN: What's that?
MS. KNOL: Only once.
MR. GINDIN: Only once.
11
MS. KNOL:
I, I'm usually -- well, I think they
12
13
14
15
respect what I say after I say it because I'm kind of right
-- as you notice, I'm really direct and I really give my
opinions about things and the way I see it and what I
think, and I'm all for working together with them.
16
Absolutely.
I wish that, and that's what I say, why can't
17
you see us as part of the solution instead, you know.
If
18
19
20
21
we're good enough for the parents to come and do our
parenting program, why can't we be good enough to, at least
when you have your sessions with the families, to be there
to be a part of the solution, right, because we're there
22
with them all the time, every day.
The workers are only
23
there whenever they have an opportunity.
24
MR. GINDIN:
So you feel you know the families
25
much better than they do?
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
3
4
5
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: And you'd like to see more
collaboration between child welfare system and
organizations like yourself?
MS. KNOL: Absolutely.
6
7
MR. GINDIN:
presume? All right.
All of you would agree with that, I
8
9
Now, if I can ask Ms. Roussin in particular, you
talked about your organization being run by and staffed by
10
all or mostly aboriginal people.
And what would be the
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significance of that? Why do you feel that's important?
MS. ROUSSIN: Well, I think that in the
neighbourhoods that we work in they are predominantly
indigenous and so it's very important that we have folks
who are represented at all levels of our organization,
having, you know, a board of directors, having staff, you
know, and then the folks that we serve are also aboriginal.
I think that our families go and interact with a lot of
other services and systems and just don't see not even one
indigenous person ever, and so you know, showing that we
can be the workers, too, I think is, is good role modeling.
I think that there's also a level of understanding that
comes with being raised, you know, either -- if you've been
raised in an indigenous community or an indigenous family
or indigenous environment, and some of our, our staff
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
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haven't been, if they've been adopted out or something like
that, but they've been treated like an indigenous person
because they look like an indigenous person, right,
regardless of what their environment has been. And then I,
I think that there's also a pretty common indigenous value
base that, as an organization, that we promote, and so when
we hire staff, you know, part of the intervening process is
about that value base, so I like to say that, you know, as
an indigenous, a First Nations woman, the organization that
I'm working for is very lined up with my personal values
and so I think that a lot of the staff would say that as
well, and so the families that come in would feel that, you
know, we would share that perspective and, and value base.
14
MR. GINDIN:
So the staff are better able to
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25
understand what aboriginal families may have been going
through because of their own experiences; that, that would
help?
MS. ROUSSIN: They've -- yeah, they have a common
experience, a common history, yeah.
MR. GINDIN: And the families themselves, who are
mostly aboriginal, you get the feeling that they appreciate
that they're dealing with aboriginal staff who know where
they're coming from?
MS. ROUSSIN: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: Okay. Got you. Okay.
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
And I have a question for Ms. Cyr.
And I'm not
2
sure if this is in the evidence but I understand that you
3
had written a letter recently to Ms. Walsh.
I don't know
4
5
6
7
8
9
if this is actually in the evidence and I, I don't think we
need to have it there, necessarily, but I, I wanted to
quote a paragraph from your letter, and if you feel like
you want to see the whole letter again, feel -- oh, you
have it? All right.
At page 4 of that letter, under the heading
10
11
12
Current Child Protection Practice.
front of you?
MS. CYR: Yes.
Do you have that in
13
14
15
MR. GINDIN:
sentence there is:
And what you say in the first
16
17
18
"The protection of children is a
fundamental responsibility of
parents, communities and society
19
in general.
As highlighted by
20
21
22
23
24
Phoenix Sinclair's tragic life and
the resulting Inquiry, children in
Manitoba are still falling through
the cracks of our child welfare
system."
25
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
And I'm interested particularly in what you mean
by "still" and what that's based on.
3
MS. CYR:
That comment is based on my experience
4
5
6
7
as the CEO of Métis Child and Family Services Authority and
the program manager of the family enhancement program at
ANCR and my 14 years prior experience in women's centres
and youths urban shelters.
8
9
experience?
MR. GINDIN:
So that's based on a lot of
10
MS. CYR: Correct.
11
MR. GINDIN:
And your opinion is that it's still
12
happening?
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MS. CYR: Correct.
MR. GINDIN: Okay. And I think it was Ms. Knol
who said that, when you were talking about some of the
problems in interacting with CFS and social workers, is
that you have to chase them down, I think is -- was it you
who said that?
MS. KNOL: Yeah.
MR. GINDIN: And that, in fact, you take detailed
notes of the meetings you have with social workers.
MS. CYR: (Inaudible).
MR. GINDIN: Was it you who said that?
MS. KNOL: I didn't say to (inaudible).
MS. CYR: I (inaudible). I record.
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
3
MR. GINDIN: Okay. And the reason that you --
that's what I was getting at.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Record.
4
MR. GINDIN:
Why do you feel that you need to
5
record --
6
MS. CYR: Conversations.
7
MR. GINDIN:
-- in fine detail the conversations
8
that you have with social workers?
9
MS. CYR:
Because I've had social workers say
10
11
12
13
14
things in regards to the way they speak to our families.
It's the context in which they speak, and they will often
make decisions in those meetings and bring them back and
their supervisor will either override or the program
manager will override that decision, and they'll come back
15
and say it's never happened or they never said that.
And
16
that's happened on several occasions.
So I, in all my
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18
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20
21
22
23
24
25
experience in child welfare, is I record absolutely every
conversation.
MR. GINDIN: So there's a discrepancy often --
MS. CYR: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: -- between what families are telling
you and what social workers are saying the families are
saying?
MS. CYR: Yeah. There's a discrepancy between
what they're saying to the family and what they're saying
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
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4
to us and what the family's understanding.
MR. GINDIN: I see.
MS. CYR: Correct.
MS. TAYLOR: Um-hum.
5
MR. GINDIN:
And that's happened enough times
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14
that you have resorted to keeping very detailed notes of
these meetings?
MS. CYR: Absolutely.
MR. GINDIN: All right. And I know that at some
point during the, Ms. Walsh's questioning, the question of
SDM tools came up, and Ms. Cyr, I noticed, maybe I was
wrong, but I think I noticed your eyes rolling and it
sounded like you couldn't wait to say something about that.
Did I -- am I correct in noticing that?
15
MS. CYR:
I'm not a, I'm not a huge supporter of
16
the SDM tools. I never have been. I've been very vocal in
17
standing committee on my position on the SDM tools.
I was
18
19
20
21
22
a strong advocate for signs of safety and that practice. I
would certainly recommend a paradigm shift in child, child
welfare practice from very risk-based to more safety-based,
strength-based, and I know that the only tool out of the
SDM that's really an actuarial tool is the probability of
23
future harm.
The rest of the tools are ticky box tools
24
25
that we fit our families into.
My issue with the SDM is that a number of
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
2
families come up as high risk, and the problem with risk is
it's historical and it's very difficult for families to
3
change their risk levels.
If you are a First Nations,
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5
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7
Métis urban aboriginal person living in the north end in
poverty with multiple children, you tend to come up on the
high side of that scale and right away there is a file
opened on you and then it goes through this whole triage
8
system.
It is unfair to families to hold them up even for
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a day, and that's what we seem to have forgotten in child
welfare, that we're making the assumption, based on my
assessment of risk on you on my little ticky box that I
showed up with that you're now, your probability of future
13
harm is quite high.
And most families I know that in my,
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in my experience at ANCR and Métis was that numbers of
families showed up high and there was lots of overrides on
those, and that actually workers would forfeit their
professional judgment because they had what I called the
cover-your-butt tool and were able to take it off and say,
hey look, but it said it was higher so this is why I acted
this way.
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MR. GINDIN:
So would you agree that whatever
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tools are used, there's no replacing good professional
sound judgment?
MS. CYR: Yes. Hence my concern about the depth
and breadth of practice within child welfare.
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
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MR. GINDIN:
I take it you would all agree that,
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and would recommend, that the government or someone from
the government ought to be consulting with organizations
like yours, correct?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MS. ROUSSIN: Yes.
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MR. GINDIN:
And in terms of funding, Ms. Knol,
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particularly I think your comment was that obviously you
could use more money but not if there's strings attached.
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: Essentially is what you're saying?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
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MR. GINDIN:
You would like to still be able to
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do the job the way you think it should be done and not be
told how to do it.
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MS. KNOL:
Well, doesn't work that way, because
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we know that building the relationship and the trust is how
people will talk to you. And we go on strength base, so we
look at what they do well and make them feel better and
then they start working on the places where they're lacking
resources, and then they'll look for those tools. But once
you start saying -- it's as simple as someone coming in our
door that has all these issues, addictions and stuff like
this, but you know what, they make really good bannock. So
say, hey, you know what, you make really good bannock,
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
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we're having soup on Wednesday, can you help with helping
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other people learn how to make bannock and stuff?
She
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starts feeling good.
All of a sudden she's in parenting,
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she's going to my addiction support program that's in the
same building, because they're all there to become a family
and they become resources for themselves. It's amazing how
resilient and how much skills they really have if they
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start believing in themselves.
But if people keep saying,
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you can't do this right, you don't do this right, you're
not doing this right, you're just kind of boom, boom, boom,
coming lower and lower instead of being six foot tall
you're now four foot tall, because they've just told you
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you can't do anything right.
So where do you start going
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from there?
We work by, hey, you do this really good, can
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you help with that. And you see that you're productive and
you're doing something good, you know what, you work on
your own other things because you just want to keep doing
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better.
Somebody believes in you and you can start
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believing in yourself.
experience.
Because I know that's my own
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I didn't go back to school until I was in my late
thirties because I started volunteering all of a sudden.
All I was, was a waitress, minimum wage, before then but I
started volunteering because of my son and started getting
involved, and somebody started believing that I could do a
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
lot of things and then I started believing it.
Then they
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encouraged me to go back to school, which I said I would
never go back to school. But I went back and got my degree
because I, when I found out that that could work in helping
and working with families that same with me, in the same
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situation.
And, see, we don't forget where we came from.
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If you've never been there, how can you understand, know
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what I mean?
And so I think that that's what gives us a
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heads up sometimes, too, is that they trust you because
they know, I've been there, I'm not perfect.
MR. GINDIN: And you've mentioned --
MS. KNOL: But you know what, but I can change.
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MR. GINDIN:
You've mentioned that -- you've
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talked about trust during your --
MS. KNOL: Yes, yes.
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MR. GINDIN:
-- all of you have talked about
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trust.
And the feeling is that families don't seem to
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trust social workers because they identify them with
apprehending children?
MS. KNOL: Yes.
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MR. GINDIN:
It seems like you're all pretty
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clear that they should stick to doing that but as far as
helping families go, it should be other people doing that.
MS. KNOL: Yeah.
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MR. GINDIN:
Like people in the community like
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
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yourselves, correct? Do you all agree with that?
MS. CYR: Yes, but not in isolation.
MR. GINDIN: Okay.
MS. CYR: Those two cannot work in isolation from
each other.
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MR. GINDIN:
They have to collaborate, work
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together?
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MS. CYR: Right.
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MR. GINDIN:
To what extent do you use or rely
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on, rely on extended families in the work that you do?
MS. CYR: We rely on them heavily. We do family
group conferencing and safety network building so we do
rely on (inaudible) and other support mechanisms and
people.
MR. GINDIN: Is that correct for all of you? Is
it --
MS. ROUSSIN: Yeah. I would even, for our --
well, I think probably for most of us, I would even go
further to say that it's the, the -- we're looking at
building natural support systems because if, if you have a
whole bunch of professional services surrounding a family,
that's artificial and it's only there for probably a
limited time or it's only there on a nine to five basis.
So we're always working to figure out what the natural
support systems are for families because we know our
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
isolation is not good for anybody.
And so, you know, if
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they're, if the family connections are -- or family and
friend connections are not good, can we work at making them
better, you know, and then having many, many of them
because we -- you can't just have a single source of
support, right. Like, so within the extended family system
who are -- who else is within that system that can -- or
within that family that can be around for this piece or
that piece. You know, by all of us working together we can
get the, the support then.
MR. GINDIN: Was there --
MS. TAYLOR: I just wanted to add that I wouldn't
want to paint all social workers with the same, same brush.
It comes with people that have a particular way of thinking
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about working with people.
So I'm not about to paint all
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social workers should not be in somebody's life.
I just
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want to emphasize that it comes down to where are they
coming from, are they there acting in the best interests of
the individual, are they seeing that person's strength. So
I'm not about to sit there and say, yeah, all social
workers, let's get rid of them, they're, they're no good
and we're the greatest, because I have lots of people that
I work with that come from various professions, and I
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wouldn't want to paint us all the same.
It comes down to
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individual people and how are they acting in the best
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
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interests of an individual, so I just wanted to put clarity
on that one.
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MR. GINDIN:
You want to see people with
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commitment and passion for what they do?
MS. TAYLOR: Yes.
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MR. GINDIN:
and, and maybe some --
MS. TAYLOR:
And there are some that have that
And others that do not, or also the
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system probably maybe erodes it out of them because you
know, like working in a system, it's a very scary world.
Like, I don't know what I would be or who I would be if I
was in corrections -- or not corrections -- protection
because if I feared that something was going to happen and
I didn't feel I have enough flexibility to make decisions
about being able to see some grey, so I think there's a
part that the system has to be looked at and how much
flexibility does a front line worker that's a social worker
actually really have to be able to see the grey.
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MR. GINDIN:
You'd like to see more discretion,
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right?
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MS. TAYLOR: Well, discretion in a way because we
all have to sort of have some structure. But I really want
people to be able to see that person and have tons of
training on what is it like to look at a strength of an
individual versus always seeing them as a deficit.
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B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
1
MR. GINDIN: And do you --
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MS. TAYLOR:
And those can be acquired, I think,
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over the years or something.
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MR. GINDIN:
Do you feel like maybe there's too
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much bureaucracy that gets in the way when we're talking
about the child welfare system? Sounds like you --
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MS. TAYLOR:
Any large institution I would say
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that, yes.
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MR. GINDIN: Okay. And I, and I guess one of the
other problems with some social workers and some families
is that there's a lot of switching around with new workers
coming in all the time rather than a consistent approach,
which I take it is where the extended family has the
advantage.
MS. KNOL: Um-hum.
MR. GINDIN: Am I correct? You all agree with
that?
MS. TAYLOR: Yeah.
MS. KNOL: Yes.
MS. ROUSSIN: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: Okay. Those are my questions.
Thank you.
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you, Mr. Gindin. Mr.
McKinnon, do you have any questions?
MR. MCKINNON: Not at this point, no.
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PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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THE COMMISSIONER: All right. Anybody else?
Well, I guess we -- Ms. -- any re-examination?
MS. WALSH: No, Mr. Commissioner.
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THE COMMISSIONER:
Well, let me thank you all
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very much for coming.
As you know, the purpose of this
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inquiry is to make recommendations ultimately to better
protect Manitoba children and you've all made a valuable
contribution to the record; and what you've said, as I said
earlier, was taken down, we'll be reading it and, and
hopefully come up with a report that's going to be of some
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valuable assistance.
And again, the thanks for you -- to
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you all for giving the time and attention and the thought
that you've given to the problems that we've got on our
plate here, and you've certainly been of help to us. Thank
you.
MS. WALSH: Thank you.
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(WITNESSES EXCUSED)
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MS. WALSH:
Mr. Commissioner, that's it for
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today.
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THE COMMISSIONER: Mr. Gindin have something?
MR. GINDIN: No, no. No, no.
MS. WALSH: Next week we are ...
THE COMMISSIONER: Are we somewhere else?
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PROCEEDINGS MAY 31, 2013
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MS. WALSH: We are. We're at the convention
centre, I think, and we don't start till Tuesday.
THE COMMISSIONER: That's right. It's a threeday
week --
MS. WALSH: Yes.
THE COMMISSIONER: -- next week. Tuesday,
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Wednesday, Thursday.
complete.
All right.
morning at 9:30.
And then that, that hopefully will
We stand adjourned till Tuesday
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MS. WALSH: Thank you.
THE COMMISSIONER: Thank you.
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(PROCEEDINGS ADJOURNED TO JUNE 4, 2013)
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